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NATO stands “vigilant, committed, and ready,” Lithuania’s foreign minister said Tuesday, after an allied fighter jet destroyed a drone that crossed into the country’s airspace from Belarus — the latest in a string of aerial incursions testing the alliance’s eastern border with Russia.
Kestutis Budrys credited the interception to the strength of collective defence, thanking the allies whose air presence, he said, protects Baltic skies and reinforces regional security.
But the message lands beyond Vilnius: as Russia’s war on Ukraine grinds on, the alliance’s eastern members are increasingly treating airspace violations — deliberate or not — as tests of NATO’s resolve, and Tuesday’s response was framed as proof the system works.
President Gitanas Nauseda confirmed the incident on social media, saying the drone had been destroyed.
“A drone that just entered Lithuanian airspace was destroyed by NATO fighter jets,” Gitanas Nauseda wrote in a post on X.
“With Russia intensifying its aggression against Ukraine, such readiness is vital for our region,” he added.
Lithuania’s National Crisis Management Centre said the drone had crossed from Belarus, moved through the Lentvaris and Trakai areas heading west, and came down in a rural area near the village of Pratkūnai, in Kaunas county — the first time a drone has been shot down over Lithuanian territory.
Moscow has not commented on the incident.
The episode was not isolated. Hours later, Poland announced it had launched its own “aviation operations,” citing Russian jet-powered drones striking Ukrainian territory near its borders.
Warsaw described the measures as preventive, intended to secure airspace in regions adjacent to the conflict — a sign that vigilance is spreading well beyond the Baltic states.
Testing fragile energy site truce
Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia have reported repeated drone incursions since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine began in 2022, but interceptions by NATO aircraft remain rare enough to draw attention.
The alliance’s air-policing mission shot down a Ukrainian drone that strayed into Estonian airspace in May — its first such interception since the war started.
European officials have also pointed to Russia diverting Ukrainian drones aimed at industrial and oil facilities near St Petersburg, on the Gulf of Finland.
The incursion comes at a delicate diplomatic moment. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said Kyiv is ready to take “de-escalatory steps” if Moscow reciprocates, after US President Donald Trump announced the two sides had agreed to halt strikes on each other’s energy infrastructure.
Even so, fighting continued overnight: Ukrainian forces struck Russian military targets in Krasnodar Krai, while Russia launched 102 drones at Ukraine.
The incident also lands against a longer-running shift in Lithuanian policy. Since Nauseda said in July he wanted the country involved in Western nuclear deterrence against Moscow, Lithuania has begun the process of lifting its constitutional ban on hosting nuclear weapons — a move likely to draw fresh attention across European capitals as the debate over the continent’s own deterrence intensifies.
Additional sources • AFP