Last week, Ukrainian drones reportedly landed in Latvia, Estonia, and Lithuania. Russian propaganda was quick to react.
Over the past week, Ukrainian drones have repeatedly veered off course and entered the airspace of NATO countries bordering Russia. Authorities in Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, and Finland all reacted with understanding, stating that whether the drones were Russian or Ukrainian, the incursions were a result of Moscow’s full-scale war. Meanwhile, Russian propaganda outlets quickly took advantage of the situation to spread false claims that the Baltic states had opened their skies to Ukrainian drones targeting Russia. Meduza sums up the latest developments, drawing in part on reporting by BBC News Russian.
Early on the morning of March 24, drones entered both Latvian and Estonian airspace from Russian territory, according to the Estonian Internal Security Service (KAPO) and Latvia’s Defense Ministry.
In Estonia, a drone struck a smokestack at a power plant in the country’s northeast. Energy officials said the plant suffered no significant damage and that power systems continued operating normally.
Following an investigation, KAPO Director General Margo Palloson confirmed the drone was Ukrainian. Estonian Foreign Minister Margus Tsahkna said the aircraft was not aimed at Estonia, and that its arrival was a direct consequence of Russia’s military aggression in Ukraine.
Palloson also said other drones had violated Estonian airspace, prompting the activation of the Baltic Air Policing mission.
Baltic officials believe the Ukrainian drones most likely strayed into their airspace during a large-scale Ukrainian strike on Russia’s Leningrad region and the Ust-Luga port on the Baltic, carried out overnight.
In Latvia, debris from a drone was found near the town of Krāslava in the country’s southeast, close to the Belarusian border. Latvian military officials said the drone was “of Ukrainian origin” and had exploded before coming down.
Units from the Latvian Armed Forces, State Police, and State Border Guard were deployed to the crash site near the village of Dobročina in Krāslava County. No casualties were reported.
Lithuania had reported a similar incident days earlier, on March 23, when drone debris fell onto the ice of Lake Lavisas near the Lithuanian-Belarusian border. Lithuanian officials later said the drone was Ukrainian and had been intended to strike targets inside Russia.
“At first glance, it does appear that the drone that came down in Latvia may have been Ukrainian, as was the case in Lithuania. I can confirm that a similar incident occurred in Estonia,” Latvian Prime Minister Evika Siliņa told Delfi.
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She attributed the incidents to the scale of Russian drone attacks on Ukraine, one of the largest of which had taken place the previous night. “Given the frequency of attacks on Ukraine, we should expect Ukrainian countermeasures to be substantial. We are on the border, and we feel that,” she said, adding that Latvia’s air defense systems had performed excellently.
Brigadier General Ēģils Leščinskis, Deputy Chief of the Joint Staff of the National Armed Forces, said the drones had either gone off course or been knocked off trajectory by electronic warfare, sending them “somewhere they were never meant to go.”
“This is a consequence of Russia’s full-scale war of aggression. We should expect to see incidents like this again,” KAPO Director General Palloson said.
Russia’s propaganda spin
The Kremlin moved quickly to exploit the incidents. Latvia’s Defense Ministry told Delfi that Moscow was running a “large-scale, coordinated information operation” against the three Baltic states, pushing the claim that they had deliberately opened their airspace to Ukrainian drones targeting Russia.
The narrative was amplified by the Telegram channel Mash and state TV propagandist Olga Skabeyeva, among others.
The ministry stressed that the Baltic states play no role in planning or carrying out Ukrainian operations, though added that they do support Ukraine through financial assistance, military equipment, and humanitarian aid.
The agency also said it believes the disinformation campaign is designed to discredit NATO, sow social division, erode public trust in state institutions, and weaken support for Ukraine.
Finland, too
In the days that followed, the incursions expanded beyond the Baltic states. On March 29, Finnish authorities announced that two drones had come down on the country’s territory. Prime Minister Petteri Orpo said they were most likely Ukrainian, and President Alexander Stubb later confirmed that one had been identified as such.
“I want to emphasize that there is no military threat to Finland,” Stubb wrote on X. “The investigation is ongoing. We are monitoring the situation.”
Ukrainian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Heorhii Tykhyi said the drones had not been headed toward Finland, and that their ending up there was most likely the result of Russian electronic warfare disrupting their navigation. “We have already apologized to the Finnish side for this incident,” he said, adding that Ukraine was sharing all relevant information to help establish what happened.
The episode also came up in a call between Volodymyr Zelensky and President Stubb. “Alex and I see this situation the same way. We are providing all the necessary information,” Zelensky said.