A plane transporting Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to Norway for the king’s state funeral came close to being struck by a drone while preparing to depart Moldova on Tuesday, Reuters reported.
Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre disclosed the incident to public broadcaster NRK on Wednesday, according to the outlet, after Zelensky’s aircraft had landed safely in Oslo on Tuesday evening.
“His plane was almost hit by a drone as it was about to take off from Moldova. That is the reality he is facing,” Støre said. He did not say how near the drone came to the Ukrainian president’s aircraft.
A Moldovan government spokesperson later said the episode involved two Russian drones, and that Zelensky’s trip to Oslo was delayed after authorities shut down Moldova’s airspace.
The aircraft was eventually given permission to depart after officials established that one of the Russian drones had come down on Moldovan territory, the spokesperson told Reuters.
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One landed in a field north of the capital, sparking a fire, while the other continued into Romanian airspace.
The incursions forced Chișinău International Airport to temporarily suspend arrivals and departures Tuesday, sending incoming flights into holding patterns or diverting them to neighboring countries, according to tracking data.
Moldovan President Maia Sandu denounced the incursions as a “serious threat to people’s lives” and separately condemned a Russian drone strike on a border crossing with Ukraine that killed two people.
Zelensky arrived in Oslo Tuesday evening, where he discussed military aid, including air defense support and civilian assistance with Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide and Finance Minister Jens Stoltenberg, according to Deutsche Welle.
The Institute for the Study of War also said a Russian Shahed drone flew through Moldovan and Romanian airspace for about an hour Tuesday before crashing in Moldova.