US, Russia swap charges over Black Sea spy plane incident

The Pentagon on Wednesday complained that a Russian fighter jet flew within 10 feet of a US Navy surveillance aircraft, in what officials called an unsafe intercept over the Black Sea.
Moscow said the interception was “in strict accordance with international rules” as it accused the US plane of snooping on Russian army exercises.
US Navy Capt. Jeff Davis, a Pentagon spokesman, said the Russian SU-27 Flanker fighter made the unsafe maneuver Wednesday near a US Navy P-8A Poseidon aircraft that was conducting routine operations in international airspace.
The Russian jet conducted four intercepts of the Poseidon, and the one that was considered unsafe lasted about 19 minutes. 
In Moscow, the defense ministry said in a statement it dispatched Su-27 jets to check out the US P-8 Poseidon planes as they “twice tried to get close to the Russian border over the Black Sea without their transponders turned on.”
“After the Russian fighters got close to the spy planes for visual confirmation and to determine their wing numbers the American aircraft changed course sharply and flew away,” the statement said. “The Russia pilots acted in strict accordance with international rules for flights.”
The Russian statement said that this was “not the first attempt” by NATO aircraft to get close to the country’s borders to spy on major military drills currently taking place on the Ukraine border and the annexed Crimea peninsula.
Relations between Russia and the West are currently at their lowest point since the Cold War over Moscow’s seizure of Crimea from Ukraine and alleged fueling of a separatist conflict in the ex-Soviet country.
The two sides have reported an uptick in similar mid-air incidents between their forces as Moscow flexes its muscles and US-led alliance NATO beefs up its forces in Eastern Europe. In one more dramatic incident earlier this year, Russian jets buzzed over the USS Donald Cook in the Baltic Sea, coming within 30 feet of the warship.

Source: Arab News