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An unmanned aircraft developed in the United States was being flown over the Black Sea when a Russian fighter plane collided with it on Tuesday in the afternoon. Ultimately, the drone plunged into the water, sparking a fresh diplomatic-military conflict between Washington and Moscow.
General James Hecker, head of the US Air Force in Europe, released a statement. "Our MQ-9 aircraft was conducting routine operations in international airspace when it was intercepted and destroyed by a Russian Sukhoi Su-27 fighter jet, resulting in a crash and total loss of the drone.
An attack against one of NATO's aircraft is being reported for the first time since the commencement of the war in Ukraine, which raises alarms across the globe. The location of the event, the airspace over the Black Sea in front of the Ukrainian port city of Odessa, which is currently under Russian military control and is a major hub for the sale of cereal to the rest of the globe, is also of utmost importance.
General Hecker emphasised that "this is a dangerous and unprofessional act on the side of the Russians," adding that "aggressive activities" by Russian operators could result in mistakes and unintentional military escalation.
According to the Pentagon, two Russian SU-27 jets repeatedly poured gasoline on the US drone, causing it to crash, as it was conducting surveillance missions for European security as permitted by international military agreements.
Russia, on the other hand, asserts that it did not shoot down the MQ-9 and demands that the United States stop conducting "hostile flights" close to its borders. Russian ambassador to the US, Anatoli Antonov, stated that his nation "assumes" that the US will desist from further media speculation and halt aircraft near Russian borders. Although Russia does not seek conflict, we view any move that involves the use of United States weapons as being overtly hostile, the ambassador said.
Moscow claims that the drone would have breached a temporary airspace use zone that was set up by Russia to conduct its military activities. Following the incident, an American P-8A Poseidon maritime reconnaissance aircraft was hovering near the coast of Romania, maybe to see if any Russian ships were attempting to collect the plane's wreckage.
Ukraine, for its part, did not hold back in charging Russia with attempting to "prolong" the conflict. Oleksiy Danilov, the secretary of the Ukrainian Security Council, claimed that the incident involving the American MQ-9 Reaper drone that Russia caused in the Black Sea was a warning from Putin that he was prepared to widen the conflict zone and include additional parties.
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