Russia apologises for last Friday’s violation of Finnish airspace

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  Russia has apologised to Finland for last Friday’s violation of Finnish airspace by a military plane.
      In a brief statement to the news agency Interfax on Tuesday, Russian Air Force spokesman Aleksandr Drobyshevski said that Russia regrets the incursion, and promised that Russia would take all possible action to prevent such occurrences in the future.
      The Russian armed forces also made public their own report in the incident, officially admitting that the territorial violation had taken place.
      Finnish Foreign Minister Erkki Tuomioja said that Finland had requested an explanation from Russia on Monday.
     
Drobyshevski said that the investigation conducted by the armed forces confirmed that the aircraft that had strayed into Finnish territory was a Naval Tupolev Tu-134 troop transporter, which had taken off from an airfield near St. Petersburg at 1:53 PM, en route to Kaliningrad.
      "While using the narrow air corridor along the Finnish border, the crew made a bad navigational error and strayed 1,000 metres into Finnish airspace", Drobyshevski said.
      He added that Russia plans to launch an extensive training programme for air crews flying over the Gulf of Finland so that similar incidents might be avoided in the future.
     
The Finnish Coast Guard issued its report on the incident on Tuesday. According to the report, the Tu-134 entered Finnish airspace at 2:23 PM on Friday, and returned to international airspace at 2:25 PM, flying about 17.5 kilometres in Finnish airspace. The plane flew at an altitude of 7.4 kilometres, and reached a maximum of 1.2 kilometres inside Finnish territory.
      In the early summer Finland submitted a diplomatic note to Russia, complaining that Russian planes had violated Finnish airspace 11 times between October 2004 and May 2005.
      When Russia denied the violations, Prime Minister Matti Vanhanen (Centre) took up the issue with Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov when the two met in early June. Fradkov promised that procedures would be changed to make sure that the violations are not repeated. However, he also said that the suspected incursions were so minor that it is difficult to prove that they actually happened.
      The open admission and apology can therefore be seen to be a departure from previous practice.
      Finland’s decision to make public reported airspace violations by foreign aircraft also reflects a new policy. Prime Minister Vanhanen said that Finland would continue to inform the public of all such incidents.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Russia admits violation of Finnish airspace by navy transport plane (9.8.2005)
  Russian plane violates Finnish airspace again in Gulf of Finland (8.8.2005)
  Russia officially denies - and tacitly admits - airspace violations (2.6.2005)
  Russia tells Prime Minister Vanhanen airspace violations exaggerated (8.6.2005)

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