His warning was echoed by Poland\u2019s prime minister, Donald Tusk, who told reporters earlier in the day: \u201cI want to be very clear. We will make a decision to shoot down flying objects without discussion when they violate our territory and fly over Poland<\/a>. There is no room for debate here.\u201d<\/p>\n On Friday, Estonia reported that three Russian MiG-31 jets had crossed into its airspace for 12 minutes before being forced to withdraw. The incident followed the entry of 20 Russian drones into Polish skies earlier this month, which Nato fighters shot down, and a separate Russian drone incursion into Romania.<\/p>\n The breaches have rattled Europe, particularly countries bordering Russia, fuelling fears that Moscow is testing Nato\u2019s defence commitments.<\/p>\n Denmark\u2019s foreign minister, Lars L\u00f8kke Rasmussen, said: \u201cRussia clearly feels it can act with impunity in Ukraine<\/a>, the Baltic Sea, the Black Sea, the whole of eastern Europe.\u201d<\/p>\n He added: \u201cRussia\u2019s neighbours, not unreasonably, fear they could be next.\u201d<\/p>\n Estonia, which called for the emergency meeting, told the security council that its record of the jets\u2019 incursion was \u201cbased on hard facts, based on solid evidence, whatever Russia is claiming\u201d.<\/p>\n Holding up a printout from the country\u2019s air radar, Estonia\u2019s foreign minister, Margus Tsahkna, pointed to what he said was a clear \u201cviolation of Estonian territory and sovereignty\u201d.<\/p>\n He also displayed closeup photographs of the Russian jets, stressing that they were \u201ccarrying missiles and were combat-ready\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cThe violation is crystal clear, and Russia is lying again, as it has lied before several times,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Russia has rejected Estonia\u2019s claims and has said it lacks evidence.<\/p>\n Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin spokesperson, told reporters on Monday: \u201cWe never heard in the Estonian statement that they have objective monitoring data to back up their claim. That is why we consider such words to be empty, unfounded and a continuation of a completely reckless pattern of escalating tensions and provoking a confrontational atmosphere.\u201d<\/p>\n But at the emergency UN session, the incursions drew widespread condemnation as reckless.<\/p>\n skip past newsletter promotion<\/a><\/p>\n Sign up to This is Europe<\/p>\n The most pressing stories and debates for Europeans \u2013 from identity to economics to the environment<\/p>\n Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain information about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. If you do not have an account, we will create a guest account for you on theguardian.com<\/a> to send you this newsletter. You can complete full registration at any time. For more information about how we use your data see our Privacy Policy<\/a>. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy<\/a> and Terms of Service<\/a> apply.<\/p>\n after newsletter promotion<\/p>\n \u201cThese latest acts are dangerous and reckless,\u201d said the British foreign secretary, Yvette Cooper. \u201cWe stand ready to take all steps necessary to defend Nato skies and Nato\u2019s territory \u2026 If we need to confront planes operating in Nato airspace without permission, we will.\u201d<\/p>\n Some European allies have raised concerns that Donald Trump has failed to treat the incidents with sufficient seriousness, limiting himself to brief condemnations.<\/p>\n Mike Waltz, the new US ambassador to the UN, sought to reassure Nato allies at the meeting, saying: \u201cThe United States and our allies will defend every inch of Nato territory. Russia must urgently stop such dangerous behaviour.\u201d<\/p>\n He added: \u201cEither Moscow wants to escalate and pull more countries into this conflict with Ukraine, or it doesn\u2019t have full control of those who operate its fighter planes and drones. Either scenario is very disconcerting.\u201d<\/p>\n In Moscow, Vladimir Putin appeared to continue his recent overtures to Washington amid growing frustrations from Trump with the Russian president over faltering efforts to end the Ukraine war, as well as stalled talks between the US and Russia on other bilateral issues.<\/p>\n \u201cWe want to avoid provoking a further strategic arms race,\u201d Putin told his security council during a televised meeting.<\/p>\n But he coupled the conciliatory note with combative language, saying that Russia was \u201ccapable of responding to any threats with military-technical measures\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"European allies have vowed to shoot down any Russian aircraft violating their airspace after Nato members accused Moscow…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":153958,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[49,50,51,47,52,48],"class_list":{"0":"post-153957","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/153957","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=153957"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/153957\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/153958"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=153957"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=153957"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=153957"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Yvette](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/6707.jpg\")
Yvette Cooper says UK will confront Russian planes in Nato airspace \u2013 video<\/p>\n