Lithuania extends the closure of the airspace at the border with Belarus until December

Lithuania plans to leave its airy space closed along the Eastern border with Belarus until December 1, BNS said on Thursday, referring to the Lithuanian army. According to the DPA report, TASR reports this.

• Lithuania extended the closure of the airspace at the border with Belarus.
• The reason is the safety risk of drones and military exercise Zapad-20125.
• The Lithuanian Parliament approved new measures to neutralize the drones.
• Recently, Russian drones have disrupted the airspace of Lithuania.
• The closure will run until the defense algorithms are fully introduced.

Lithuanian Minister of Defense: Extension of the measure is necessary

The Baltic country closed part of its airspace in August because of the Russian-white military exercise of the West-20125 and concerns about possible drone penetrations. It was originally planned to reopen it in October.

Lithuanian Minister of Defense said that the extension of the measure is necessary due to the recent legislative changes that make the Lithuanian army more efficiently defeat drones.

Two drones of Russian origin from Belarus disrupted the airspace of Lithuania

The adoption of these changes approved by the Lithuanian Parliament last week caused the entry of two drones of Russian origin from Belarus to Lithuanian airspace. Such penetrations have reported several countries in recent weeks; For example, the Polish airspace, according to Warsaw, disrupted nearly 20 Russian drones, some of them shot down the Allied forces.

Lithuanian Minister added that the airspace will remain closed until certain procedures and algorithms related to the defense against the drone are introduced. In her words, the system must be ready for efficient functioning.

Lithuania has a common border with Belarus, which stretches at a length of approximately 679 kilometers and forms part of the EU’s external border.