Belarus informed about a possible unmanned aerial vehicle flying towards Lithuania, reported the commander of the Lithuanian Land Forces, Brigadier General Nerijus Stankevicius.
"In the morning, we received a message from the Belarusian armed forces about possible drone movements towards Lithuania; our neighbors in Latvia received similar information," said Stankevicius to reporters on Wednesday.
The suspected drone was detected by the radars of both the Lithuanian and Latvian armies. NATO air police forces were involved: two fighters took off from the Amari airbase in Estonia, one was directed to Lithuania, and the other to Latvia.
"The task of the aircraft was to detect, visually identify, and destroy the drone; however, the operation concluded with no enemy devices being found in the air. The air police fighters aborted the mission and returned to Estonia," noted Stankevicius.
"At the moment, we cannot say where this device is: whether it crashed or simply left the territory of Lithuania. We continue the search using an Air Force helicopter and ground forces. If the operation is successful and we find debris or the downed drone, we will report it," he added.
As previously reported by the head of the National Crisis Management Center of Lithuania, Vilmantas Vitkauskas, the object disappeared from military radars in the vicinity of Maironys.
Initially, the threat was declared in the Ignalina, Utena, Švenčionys, and Zarasai districts, and later in the Vilnius and Alytus counties.
