According to the Polish Army's command in Warsaw, the ground-based air defense systems were placed on high alert this afternoon. Such measures are not unusual, but they are currently receiving special attention due to the incident involving suspected Russian drones on Polish territory last week.

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk announced on Platform X:"Due to the threat posed by Russian drones operating over Ukraine near the Polish border, a preventive air operation has begun, both Polish and allied." According to the PAP news agency, Lublin Airport was temporarily closed to civil air traffic due to the military activity. After about two hours, the Polish army announced that the air operation and the heightened alert status had ended.

Warning of"attack from the air"

According to the PAP news agency, the mayors of Swidnik and Chelm in the east of the country previously announced on social media that warning sirens had been deployed due to the aerial threat. They urged the population to remain calm. A government crisis center also sent text messages to all cell phones in five districts bordering Ukraine, warning of the"danger of an aerial attack."

During a Russian airstrike on Ukraine overnight into Wednesday, a large number of drones flew into Polish and thus NATO airspace. The Polish Air Force and other NATO allies shot down some Russian drones for the first time. Since then, Poland has received increased support from NATO allies. Operation"Eastern Sentry" was launched for this purpose. Poland has long deployed fighter jets during every major attack on western Ukraine. Ukraine has been defending itself against a Russian war of aggression since February 2022.

Romanian civil protection alerts population

In the eastern Romanian region of Tulcea on the Danube Delta near the Ukrainian border, the Romanian army also sighted a drone on Saturday. Two F-16 fighter jets from the Fetești air base took off on an observation mission. According to information from the German Press Agency (dpa), NATO also alerted two German Eurofighters to protect the airspace in Romania. The alert was in response to Russian attacks in the Ukrainian-Romanian border region.

The drone did not fly over any populated areas on Romanian territory and posed no threat, reported the Ministry of Defense in Bucharest. The region is sparsely populated. Nevertheless, civil protection officials had warned the population of the danger of potentially falling objects from the air.

The Romanian fighter jets tracked the drone for about 20 kilometers to the Romanian Danube town of Chilia Veche, after which the object disappeared from radar. Since the beginning of Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine, debris from Russian drones has fallen onto Romanian territory in the Danube Delta several times, mostly following Russian attacks on ports within sight of the Ukrainian banks of the Danube. In each case, Romanian authorities and NATO have stated that these were unintentional incidents by Russia.

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• Eurofighter