BUCHAREST: Romania scrambled fig­hter jets on Saturday when a drone breached the country’s airspace during a Russian atta­­ck on Ukrainian infrastru­c­ture near the border, the defence ministry said.

A threat of drone strikes also prompted Poland to deploy Polish and allied aircraft and close an airport in the eastern city of Lublin, three days after it shot down Russian drones in its airspace with the backing of aircraft from its Nato allies.

Romania, which shar­es a 650-km border with Ukraine, has had Russian drone fragments fall onto its territory repeatedly since Russia began waging war on its neighbour.

On Saturday, it scrambled two F-16 fighter jets and warned citizens in the south-east to take cover.

The jets det­e­cted a drone in airspace, whi­ch they followed until it dropped off the radar 20 kilometres from the border with Ukraine, the ministry said. “The drone did not fly over inhabited are­as and did not pose an immediate danger to the population.”

Published in Dawn, September 14th, 2025