US Drone Conducted Reconnaissance near Russia’s Crimea

A US drone has reportedly conducted a reconnaissance flight off the Crimean Peninsula despite multiple calls by Russia that the Pentagon halt such operations near the country’s territory.

Russia’s Sputnik news agency cited the monitoring resource, PlaneRadar, as saying that the US Global Hawk drone had carried out a reconnaissance operation over the Donbass region in Crimea and the Black Sea coast on Friday.

“The US Air Force RQ-4B-40 Global Hawk with a tail number 11-2048 and call sign FORTE10 took off from a NATO air base on the island of Sicily, monitored the demarcation line in Donbass, and then embarked on a reconnaissance flight along the Russian Black Sea coast,” the Sputnik news agency said.

In siding with Ukraine, the European Union has followed Washington’s lead in leveling several rounds of sanctions against Moscow.

The RQ-4 Global Hawk is a strategic reconnaissance unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) developed by a subsidiary of the American Northrop Grumman corporation.

The Global Hawk is one of the most expensive pieces of equipment in the US arsenal with an estimated price tag of around $220 million.

The unmanned US aircraft was taken down by Iran’s indigenous Khordad 3 air defense system in June after it had breached the country’s airspace and begun gathering intelligence and spying.

Source: Sputnik

Y.A