Moscow has called on Washington to stop "hostile" flights near its border after a US drone was intercepted by Russian fighters over the Black Sea in the first such direct encounter between the two since Russia attacked Ukraine 385 days ago.
Moscow denied causing the crash of the drone. (Reuters Archive)
Wednesday, March 15, 2023
0937 GMT -
Russian Ambassador to the US Anatoly Antonov claimed that a US unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) gathered reconnaissance information to convey it to Ukraine for the strikes on Russia.
In a Telegram comment by the Russian Foreign Ministry, Antonov said he was invited to the US State Department on Tuesday following the crash of a US drone over the Black Sea, "where (he) categorically rejected all the insinuations of the American side".
The Pentagon on Tuesday accused Russia of an "unsafe" intercept of a US MQ-9 Reaper above the Black Sea that led to the aircraft's downing.
Responding to the accusations, Antonov said: "The American UAV was straightly and provocatively moving in the direction of the Russian territory with the transponders turned off, and violated the boundaries of the temporary restricted area established for the purpose of conducting the special military operation".
0709 GMT- Russia calls on US to halt 'hostile' flights after collision
Russia's ambassador to the United States has called on Washington to stop "hostile" flights near his country's border, after an American drone was intercepted by Russian fighters over the Black Sea.
"We assume that the United States will refrain from further speculation in the media and stop flights near Russian borders," ambassador Anatoly Antonov
wrote on Telegram. "We consider any action with the use of US weaponry as openly hostile."
A Russian fighter jet on Tuesday dumped fuel on an American drone over the Black Sea and then collided with it, causing the drone to crash, the US military said, slamming the manoeuvre as "reckless".
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0700 GMT - German arms industry seeks clarity on Ukraine weapons orders
Germany’s defence industry says it stands ready to ramp up its output, including the kinds of arms and ammunition needed by Ukraine, but needs clarity about what governments want before investing in further production capacity.
Ukraine became the world’s third largest importer of arms in 2022 after Russia’s attack triggered a big flow of military aid to Kiev from the United States and Europe, according to Swedish think tank SIPRI.Some of those arms were transferred from Western military stocks to Ukraine, while in other cases Kiev has purchased equipment with its own money or funds provided by allies. " Ukraine is using ammunition, straining the capacity of Western defense companies to keep both the Ukrainian military and their own resupplied.
0400 GMT - Russia calls Western comments on its products are exempt from sanctions ‘outright lies’
“Without concrete progress in solving these systemic problems, all the Westerners' oaths about humanitarian exemptions from their sanctions, assurances of commitment to global food security and expressions of support for the efforts of the UN Secretary General are nothing more than deliberate cunning and outright lies,” Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria,Zakharova said in a statement.
Zakharova said Western reactions, notably from Washington and the European Union delegation in Moscow, in connection with the announcement of Russia’s position on the extension of the Türkiye-brokered Black Sea Grain Initiative are “striking in hypocrisy, unprofessionalism, and a complete distortion of real facts".
0200 GMT - US says Russian jet caused its drone to crash over Black Sea
A US military MQ-9 Reaper armed drone crashed into the Black Sea. The Pentagon said that one of the Russian Su-27 jets struck the propeller of the drone, making it inoperable.
Russia's defence ministry blamed "sharp maneuvering" by the drone for the crash and said that its jets did not make contact.
Russia views the drone incident as provocation, the RIA state news agency cited Russia's ambassador to the United States as saying.
0114 GMT - British defence minister Wallace says Russia should respect international airspace
British Defence Secretary Ben Wallace said that Moscow should respect international airspace, after Russia downed a U.S. drone.
He was speaking to Reuters at a defence exhibit in Chiba prefecture, near Tokyo.
Proposed amendments to Russia's citizenship law would allow for the stripping of acquired citizenship for treason and discrediting the military operation in Ukraine, Russian media reports pic.twitter.com/VdipjU583S
— TRT World Now (@TRTWorldNow) March 15, 2023
22:30 GMT - New Russian law to strip citizenship for discrediting Ukraine operation
Proposed amendments to Russia's citizenship law would allow for the stripping of acquired citizenship for treason and discrediting the military campaign in Ukraine, Russian media has reported.
Russia calls its action in Ukraine a "special military operation," while Ukraine and its allies say that is a euphemism for a full blown aggression to grab land.
The proposed amendments have been submitted to the committee.
2155 GMT - Ukraine's top military command in favour of defending Bakhmut: Zelenskyy
Ukraine's top military command is unanimously in favour of defending the sector of eastern Ukraine, including the besieged city of Bakhmut, and inflicting maximum losses on the enemy, President Voldoymyr Zelenskyy has said.
"The main focus was on ... Bakhmut," Zelenskyy said in his fresh video address.
"There was a clear position of the entire command: Strengthen this sector and destroy the occupiers to the maximum."
Russia views incident involving its Su-27 fighter jet and US military drone as "provocation", says Anatoly Antonov, Russian envoy to US, but adds Moscow is not looking for confrontation with Washington pic.twitter.com/E9SsfuiuXN
— TRT World Now (@TRTWorldNow) March 14, 2023
2134 GMT - Moscow views Black Sea drone incident as provocation
Moscow views the incident involving a Russian Su-27 fighter jet and a US military drone over the Black Sea as provocation, Russia's RIA state news agency cited Anatoly Antonov, the Russian ambassador to the United States, as saying.
"We view this incident as a provocation," Antonov said after being summoned by the US State Department.
Washington said that the fighter jet downed the US drone. Russia has denied that.
2130 GMT - White phosphorus reportedly fired in eastern Ukraine
White phosphorus munitions have been fired from Russian positions on an uninhabited area by the town of Chasiv Yar in eastern Ukraine, the AFP news agency reported.
Two projectiles were fired five minutes apart at around 4:45 pm [1445 GMT] on a road at the southern edge of Chasiv Yar leading to nearby Bakhmut, the centre of the longest and bloodiest battle of Russia's year-long offensive.
The whistling sound from the projectiles was followed by explosions caused by munitions that released small, burning balls of white phosphorus that slowly fell to the ground.The balls set fire to the vegetation on both sides of the road on a surface equivalent to the size of a football pitch.
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