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Romania deployed two F-16 fighter jets on Saturday afternoon after its Ministry of National Defense detected an aerial target about 20 kilometers northeast of Valkove, a Ukrainian town near the border. Hours later, Prime Minister Luca Niculescu condemned drone attacks on three commercial vessels off the Romanian coast.
The aircraft, part of the Romanian Air Force and assigned to air policing duty, took off from the 86th Air Base in Fetesti, the ministry said in a statement.
The National Military Command Center notified the General Inspectorate for Emergency Situations, which activated measures to warn residents in the northern and eastern parts of Tulcea County. The county lies along the Ukrainian frontier, where the Danube River marks part of the border.
Authorities said they would release further information as the situation develops.
The commercial ships were hit on Saturday evening and overnight near Sulina, a Romanian port city at the point where the Danube flows into the Black Sea. The reports did not specify who launched the drones.
Niculescu called the incidents “unacceptable” and a “violation of international law” in a post on the US social media platform X. He said Russia’s war against Ukraine was worsening the security situation in the Black Sea, and pledged to work with NATO allies to strengthen regional security after the latest attacks.
Romania has been a NATO member since 2004 and shares a long border with Ukraine. Its Danube ports and the Black Sea routes off its coast have taken on added importance since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Its air force, which operates F-16s among other aircraft, regularly polices the skies near the frontier, and the country’s northeastern counties have previously seen alerts when Russian drone activity occurred near the border.
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