<img src='https://news.cgtn.com/news/2025-09-14/Romania-Poland-scramble-aircraft-as-drones-strike-Ukraine-1GEAFAv83qU/img/77a733e08b8f478794f41859b06d37f7/77a733e08b8f478794f41859b06d37f7.png' alt='Territorial defense officers clean up debris from the destroyed roof of a house after drones struck in Poland, September 11, 2025. /VCG'
Romania became the latest NATO member state to report a drone incursion into its airspace Saturday, as Poland scrambled aircraft in response to drone strikes just over the border in Ukraine.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy warned that Russia was deliberately expanding its drone operations, and that the West needed to respond with tougher sanctions and closer defense cooperation.
U.S. President Donald Trump said he was ready to impose major sanctions on Russia once all NATO members did the same and stopped buying Russian oil.
Romania’s defense ministry said Saturday that the country’s airspace had been breached by a drone during an attack on infrastructure in neighboring Ukraine.
The country scrambled two F-16 fighter jets late on Saturday to monitor the situation following the strikes, said a defense ministry statement. The jets “detected a drone in national airspace” and tracked it until “it disappeared from the radar” near the Romanian village of Chilia Veche, it added.
Also on Saturday, Poland announced it had deployed helicopters and aircraft alongside NATO allies as Russian drones struck Ukraine near its border. Because of the drone threat, “Polish and allied aircraft are operating in our airspace, and ground-based air defence and radar reconnaissance systems have reached their highest level of alert,” the country’s military command posted in a statement on X.
Russia rejected accusations from Poland, the EU, and NATO that it had launched the drones.
Zelenskyy’s warning
While Russia denies targeting Poland, several European countries, including France, Germany and Sweden, have stepped up their support for defending Polish airspace in response.
“The Russian military knows exactly where their drones are headed and how long they can operate in the air,” said Zelenskyy. The latest drone incursions were “an obvious expansion of the war by Russia,” he added.
What was needed in response, Zelenskyy argued, were fresh sanctions against Russia and a strengthened collective defense system. “Do not wait for dozens of ‘Shaheds’ and ballistic missiles before finally making decisions,” he warned, referring to the Iranian-designed Shahed drones Russia is using.
‘Stop buying Russian oil’
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Saturday expressed concern at the drone incursion into Polish airspace earlier in the week. “If it turns out to have been deliberate, then obviously it will be… highly escalatory,” he told reporters in Washington.
Trump’s suggestion on Thursday that the incident might have happened by “mistake” was dismissed by Poland’s Prime Minister Donald Tusk. On Saturday, Trump returned to the issue of sanctions against Russia, putting the ball back in the court of his NATO allies. “I am ready to do major Sanctions on Russia when all NATO Nations have agreed, and started, to do the same thing, and when all NATO Nations STOP BUYING OIL FROM RUSSIA,” he said in a Truth Social platform post.
In Russia, officials reported that a Ukrainian drone struck one of the country’s largest oil refining complexes, located about 1,400 kilometers from the front line in Ukraine. The attack sparked a fire and caused minor damage at the facility, which belongs to the Russian oil company Bashneft and sits on the outskirts of the central city of Ufa.
A source in Ukraine’s GUR military intelligence agency claimed responsibility for the strike. Since Moscow launched its full-scale military offensive against Ukraine in February 2022, Kyiv has targeted Russian refineries in an effort to curb the Kremlin’s ability to finance the war through its fossil fuel industry.
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