A French navy plane committed to NATO, on board which was an AFP journalist, was targeted this Wednesday, January 16, by the Russian army while it was flying over the Baltic Sea, it was reported. -we learned this Thursday from a French military source.
The aircraft, which was carrying out a surveillance flight as part of an Alliance deployment in response to damage to submarine cables, of which Russia is suspected, was the victim of a “jamming attempt” as well as of a “designation by a fire control radar”, according to a communication from the French army.
“The fact of illuminating our aircraft operating in international waters with a radar reflects an aggressive action,” Colonel Guillaume Vernet, spokesperson for the army general staff, explained to AFP, the illumination qualifying in military language the act of targeting an objective by radar.
Such an initiative “is not exceptional in this area” and “means that Russia does not remain passive”, he translated.
Russia thus “made known, in a contained manner, its hostility”, but “the professional behavior of the (French) crew made it possible to avoid any escalation” while continuing its mission, Colonel Vernet further declared.
The Russian army also had little interest in carrying out its threat because “an attack on a NATO plane could provoke a sudden and serious escalation with NATO,” he said.
The type of incident suffered by the French plane, “quite serious”, is “fairly widespread” and “well beyond the borders of Europe”, estimated American General Christopher Cavoli, commander of NATO forces in Europe, during a press point Thursday in Brussels.
-The French Atlantic 2 plane took off from Brittany (West) on Wednesday, with an AFP journalist on board. He spent nearly five hours off the coast of Sweden and the Baltic countries, controlling around 200 ships, mainly civilians. But no suspicious buildings were spotted.
Several underwater telecommunications and power cables have been damaged in recent months in the Baltic Sea. European leaders and experts suspect acts of “hybrid warfare” orchestrated by Russia.
On December 25, the EstLink 2 power cable, connecting Finland and Estonia, and four other telecommunications cables were damaged, just weeks after similar damage to two telecommunications cables in Swedish waters.
The Eagle S, an oil tanker flying the flag of the Cook Islands which is said to be part of the Russian “ghost fleet”, is suspected of sabotaging these cables by the Finnish police, who invaded the ship then seized it for the needs of the ‘investigation.
Belgium
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