Latvia to beef up air security after two drone crashes, defence minister says

Latvia will deploy interceptor drones along its border to secure its airspace and ward off future drone incursions, Latvian Defence  Minister Andris Sprūds said on Friday.  

The minister also instructed the army to revise their border airspace protection plan. 

The announcement came after several drones coming from Russia entered Latvian airspace early on Thursday, with two of them crashing in the country. 

One drone crashed at an oil storage site in Rēzekne, 240 km east of Riga, causing a fire to break out in empty oil tanks. It is unclear where the second drone landed. 

Sprūds is under political pressure after Latvia faced repeated airspace incursions in recent months.

The army’s acoustic system failed to detect the first incoming drone and local residents in Rēzekne were not notified until an hour after the incident, prompting opposition parties to ask Spruds to resign.  

Opposition lawmakers already submitted a no-confidence motion against the minister in…