Berlin said on Thursday that Germany will expand its commitments to policing NATO’s eastern airspace – a day after Russia’s largest incursion into NATO airspace since the beginning of the full-scale war.
According to Reuters, a spokesperson for the German government said Berlin will “extend and expand air policing over Poland” in addition to its existing commitments in Poland and the Baltics.
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Berlin said it would also step up support for Ukraine within the EU by pushing for swift adoption of the bloc’s 19th sanctions package against Russia.
On Wednesday, Warsaw reported 19 drones violating Polish airspace – just four of which were reportedly shot down based on initial reports. Although Russian weapons have violated NATO airspace on several occasions since 2022, Wednesday’s incident was unprecedented in scale, prompting NATO troops to engage them militarily.
Although the Kremlin denies targeting Poland, Polish President Karol Nawrocki said on Thursday that Russia was attempting “to test the mechanism of action within NATO and our readiness to respond.”
As per Politico, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who recently called Russian leader Vladimir Putin a “war criminal,” made a similar accusation on Wednesday – describing Russia’s actions as “a very serious threat to peace in Europe.”
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“This completely reckless action by the Russian government is part of a long series of provocations that we have been seeing for months in the Baltic region and on NATO’s eastern flank as a whole,” Merz said.
Other NATO countries have recognized the need to bolster NATO’s eastern flank in recent weeks. On Aug. 20, the Netherlands announced the deployment of two of its three Patriot air defense systems to Poland to defend NATO’s eastern flank.
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