(Bloomberg) -- Latvia’s president said NATO needs to have the ability to shoot down Russian drones that stray into member states’ territory as he called for increased air defenses on the alliance’s eastern flank.
“NATO must adapt to the new reality — and we must shoot down drones,” President Edgars Rinkevics said in an interview on Bloomberg Television in San Francisco on Thursday. “We must protect the territory of the alliance.”
President Vladimir Putin’s military has stepped up aerial attacks on Ukraine’s infrastructure as winter draws closer, regularly sending fleets of drones to attack its territory. This month, Russian drones veered into Latvian and Romanian airspace, prompting authorities to call for stronger defenses.
An explosive-laden Russian Shahed-style drone crashed in eastern Latvia this month, flying some 55 kilometers (34 miles) into the the Baltic nation’s airspace before crashing.
Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania have called on NATO allies to react more quickly to Russian drones that cross into their airspace, since they lack fighter jets of their own. They’ve also urged a stronger mandate for the air policing mission in the Baltic region.
Poland and Romania, which have their own jets, have been able to respond more quickly, and have so far opted not to shoot them down.
Latvia, a member of the European Union and NATO, has been one of the bloc’s harshest critics of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, calling for more sanctions against Moscow and military and financial support for Kyiv.
As the war drags well into its third year, some of Ukraine’s allies are beginning to talk about how the fight against Russia’s invasion might end, Bloomberg reported this month. Rinkevics dismissed the prospects of any such breakthrough until after the US election in November — and said no such talks can begin until Moscow is halted.
“A diplomatic breakthrough or political process can only start when Russia sees it cannot move forward, that we are supporting Ukraine,” Rinkevics said.
--With assistance from Caroline Hyde.
(Adds comments on diplomacy from sixth paragraph. A previous version corrected spelling of San Francisco in second paragraph.)
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