Ukrainian president tells CBS News Russia targeted his plane with drones

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky reported that Russian drones had entered Moldovan airspace twice while his presidential plane was in the country. He made these remarks in an interview with CBS News. Zelensky stated that the Ukrainian presidential plane was in Moldova when the attacks occurred. He also mentioned that the drones used Moldovan airspace, possibly to avoid direct targeting of him.

When asked if Russia was attempting to intimidate him, Zelensky answered affirmatively. He spoke of the incidents during a comment on a Russian drone strike on a train near another, specially arranged train carrying European diplomats and officials from Ukraine to Poland. Zelensky believed that Russia was aware that "Europeans, Americans, big delegations" were aboard the special train and that Russia had attacked in Moldova, Romania, and occasionally in Poland. He described this as a "process" where Russia shows its power, and nobody responded to it.

Later, it was reported that Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre claimed that Zelensky's plane had narrowly avoided a collision with a drone as it departed Moldova for Oslo. The Moldovan government later confirmed that they had closed their airspace after detecting the drone. The Ukrainian president's departure from Chișinău was delayed by about 20 minutes due to this incident.

A source within the Ukrainian president's office told AFP that the Norwegian prime minister's account of the near-collision was "an exaggeration."

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov dismissed the threat to Zelensky's plane as "illusory," stating that the Ukrainians themselves acknowledged the same.