Rutte opposes shooting down Russian offending aircraft if they pose no threat

NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte believes that the Alliance should not shoot down Russian aircraft that violate its airspace if they do not pose a threat. He expressed this opinion during a speech in Ljubljana at the NATO Parliamentary Assembly session, video published by Clash Report.

"If the plane is not a threat, we are not going to shoot it down. And then we will carefully take it out of the airspace," Rutte said.

The NATO Secretary General emphasized that he fully agrees with this approach, because "we are strong." In his opinion, this is a proportionate response to airspace violations.

"And we are much stronger than the Russians. We don't need to shoot down Russian planes because they enter our airspace," Rutte emphasized, reiterating that this will be done if they pose an obvious threat.

"If we were weak, you might think: "Okay, we are weak, so we have to show them immediately that every time they invade our airspace, we shoot them down," continued the Alliance Secretary General.

He emphasized that NATO is "much stronger" than the Russians, so the Alliance's response is proportional.

"But we are strong, and our proportionate response sends a clear message to the Russians that we are not happy about such incursions," Rutte said.

• On September 19, Russian MiG-31 fighters violated Estonian airspace near Tallinn. In total, they were over Estonia for about 12 minutes.
• On the same day, Russian fighter jets violated the security zone of the Polish Petrobaltic drilling platform in the Baltic Sea. More than a week before, two dozen Russian UAVs violated Polish airspace.
• On September 22, Tusk said that Poland would shoot down objects that clearly violate its airspace. British Foreign Secretary to the UN said she was ready to repel the offending aircraft.