A Shahed drone launched by Russia was spotted crossing Romanian national airspace during the night of September 7 to 8 and followed by Nato fighter jets, the Romanian Ministry of Defence (MApN) announced. Another drone might have crashed on Romanian territory but has not been found yet.

Russian drones have repeatedly violated Romanian airspace since the invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Fragments of drones used by the Russian armed forces have several times been found in border areas, as Russia targets Ukrainian ports on the Danube, which flows along the border with Romania. 

Two F-16 fighter jets were launched at 02:25 to monitor the airspace in the context of Russia launching an attack against Ukraine’s civil and port infrastructure target, MApN said. At the same time, the civilian population received alerts, which are typically sent during such attacks in the immediate vicinity of the Romanian border.

"A group of attack drones violated Romania's airspace," the Ukrainian Air Force reported on Telegram at 02:49, according to Hotnews.

The MApN also mentions a possible “impact area”, most likely the place where another drone might have crash landed.

On the same night, a Russian drone was confirmed by fellow Nato member country Latvia as having crashed on its national territory.

Romania’s foreign ministry called in a statement for the end to the repeated attacks against the Ukrainian population and civilian infrastructure and the irresponsible escalation by the Russian Federation of the security situation, including at the border between Romania and Ukraine.

Both ministries confirmed that they are in contact and constantly informing the Nato Allied structures of the developments.

In similar situations, Nato stressed that the Russian drones were not aimed against Romanian/Nato targets, playing down the importance of the incident.

In an X post, outgoing Nato Deputy Secretary-General Mircea Geoana said, commenting on the latest incident, that “Nato condemns the overnight Russian airspace violation into Romanian airspace. While we have no information indicating an intentional attack by Russia against Allies, these acts are irresponsible and potentially dangerous.”