NATO intelligence flights intensify around Kaliningrad

A NATO reconnaissance aircraft has been spotted near Russia’s Kaliningrad region for the third time since the beginning of September, flying a circuit around the Russian exclave, according to a source in European Union air traffic control services cited by TASS.

The Bombardier ARTEMIS II aircraft has been using the airspace of Lithuania and Poland, as well as areas over neutral waters of the Baltic Sea, the source said.

The aircraft also flies almost daily over central parts of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, making turns near Estonia’s coast of the Gulf of Finland, according to the source.

The aircraft does not approach the borders of Russia or Belarus and maintains a distance from the border zone when flying around Kaliningrad, the source said.

The Bombardier ARTEMIS II is permanently based at an airfield in Constanța, Romania. In addition to its Baltic missions, it periodically flies over neutral waters in the southern Black Sea, travelling from west to east and back.

The aircraft has not flown that Black Sea route since the beginning of September, the source said. Last summer, it spent almost nine hours over the Black Sea in a single day, which the source described as a record of sorts.

By Aghakazim Guliyev