Lithuania's defense minister said on September 11 that NATO planes stationed in the Baltic countries should shoot down Russian drones in the airspace of his country and its neighbors, after a Russian drone went down in Latvia last week.
Since the three Baltic countries joined NATO in 2004, their skies have been patrolled by NATO aircraft because they do not have fighter jets.
NATO's mission to monitor the Baltic skies "should not only patrol, but should also, if necessary, if possible, if time permits, shorten the chain of decision-making at the NATO level so that aircraft can immediately take off and destroy drones," Laurinas Kascijunas told reporters.
The Iranian-made Russian Shahedd drone crashed on September 7 in Latvia, but did not explode.
Latvian President Edgars Rinkevics said on September 10 that his country was discussing the issue with its allies.
"We are raising the issue of drone interception protocols with our NATO partners and are asking that allied fighter jets be used as soon as the drone approaches our borders," Rinkevics told reporters.
He assessed that the problem arises, among other things, because the planes receive orders from NATO, and not from the local level, which slows down the procedure.
Polish Foreign Minister Radoslav Sikorski said earlier this month that Warsaw should have the right to shoot down Russian missiles that threaten its territory while they are still over Ukraine.
Ukraine has also asked neighboring NATO member states to shoot down Russian missiles and drones targeting its western regions.
"The Russians are increasingly targeting places near the NATO border," said the head of diplomacy Andrij Sibiha, calling for a "joint, firm and decisive response."
Shooting down those missiles "would be a dignified and correct step," he added.
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