S.Korea jets fire shots at Russia plane

SOUTH Korean air force jets fired 360 rounds of warning shots after a Russian military plane briefly violated South Korea’s airspace twice, Seoul officials have said.

Three Russian military planes – two Tu-95 bombers and one A-50 airborne early warning and control aircraft – initially entered South Korea’s air defence identification zone off its east coast before the A-50 intruded in South Korean airspace, the South’s Defence Ministry said.

South Korean fighter jets then scrambled to the area, including F-16s, and fired 10 flares and 80 rounds from machine guns as warning shots, a ministry official said.

The Russian reconnaissance aircraft left the area three minutes later, but it returned and violated the South Korean airspace again for four additional minutes later on Tuesday, the ministry official said.

He said the South Korean fighter

jets fired 10 flares and 280 rounds from machine guns as warning shots again.

Japanese chief cabinet secretary Yoshihide Suga told reporters later that the firing of warning shots was “absolutely unacceptable” in light of Japan’s territorial claims to Koreancontrolled islands that Japan calls Takeshima and South Korea calls Dokdo. He said Tokyo “strictly objected to Russia and South Korea via separate diplomatic channels and strongly requested the prevention of a recurrence”.

It was the first time a foreign military plane has violated South Korean airspace since the end of the 1950-53 Korean War.

The former Soviet Union supported North Korea and provided the country with weapons during the Korean War.