Russia’s Ambassador to Washington, Anatoly Antonov, said that Russia continues to contact the United States to prevent events. DEA News.
As the diplomat noted, the Russian Federation is not pursuing a conflict with a nuclear power. According to him, the Russian Federation “continues to maintain contacts” with the United States, including through the Ministry of Defense, “to prevent unintentional collisions”.
“I would like American politicians to take the same stance on relations with Russia,” Antonov continued.
He also stated that the Russian side did everything to prevent an aerial incident involving an American UAV over the Black Sea on March 14.
“Russia has done everything possible to prevent such events – it has brought to the attention of the international community advance information about the boundaries of the zone of the interim regime for the use of airspace. “Antonov is conducting a special military operation in Ukraine,” he said.
He emphasized that the lack of professionalism in this case is not the Russian pilots, but the US military.
“Of course, it’s a shame that the Pentagon is losing their expensive equipment. But in this case, unprofessional accusations by the US military should be directed to their address, ”the diplomat said.
Former Pentagon Chief Lloyd Austin declarationRussian fighters reportedly “committed dangerous, reckless and unprofessional actions in international airspace over the Black Sea” when they “refuelled” an American MQ-9 drone “conducting planned operations in international airspace”, then “hit” the drone by one of the aircraft. . , which caused it to fall into the sea.
Making a statement about the incident, the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation, statedIt was reported that the American UAV flew towards the Russian state border with the transponders turned off, the Russian fighters did not use airborne weapons and did not touch the object, and the drone fell into the Black Sea due to sharp maneuvering.