A RO-ALERT message was sent on Monday night to the population of Tulcea county, in the context of the drone attacks by Russian forces on civilian and port infrastructure targets in Ukraine, near the Romanian border, with two F-16 aircraft of the Romanian Air Force and two Eurofighter aircraft of the Italian Air Force carrying out surveillance and protection missions over Romania's airspace.

'On the night of April 28-29, Russian forces carried out a series of drone strikes on civilian and port infrastructure targets in Ukraine, near the border with Romania. As a result of this situation, the National Military Command Center notified the General Inspectorate for Emergency Situations on Monday, around 23:30, regarding the establishment of an air alert in Tulcea county, and a warning message was sent to the population through the RO-ALERT system, for the north-eastern area of this county,' the Ministry of National Defence (MApN) said on Tuesday.

The monitoring and surveillance systems of the Ministry of National Defence permanently monitored the airspace in the area.

According to procedures, two F-16 aircraft of the Romanian Air Force and two Eurofighter aircraft of the Italian Air Force, which are part of the Air Police Combat Service, took off successively from the 86 Borcea Air Base and the 57 Mihail Kogalniceanu Air Base, respectively, and carried out surveillance and protection missions over Romania's airspace.

The air alert ceased on Tuesday, around 04:50, and the combat aircraft returned to their deployed air bases.

During the execution of the attacks on Ukrainian targets, Romania's radar surveillance system indicated the possibility that the trajectory of one of the drones involved in the attack may have intersected, for a very short period of time, the national airspace, at a depth of up to 500 meters, in an area located about 8 km east of the town of CA Rosetti locality, Tulcea County, the last contact with this air target being detected on Ukrainian territory, MApN said.

MApN forces will carry out searches in areas where risks may arise as a result of these situations and will continue airspace surveillance missions on April 29 according to standard procedures. The allied structures are also being kept constantly informed of situations generated by attacks.

The Ministry of National Defence remains firm in its condemnation of these attacks carried out by the Russian Federation on Ukrainian civilian targets and infrastructure, which are unjustified and in serious contradiction with international law, the cited source said. AGERPRES (RO - writing by: Georgiana Tanasescu; EN - writing by: Simona Iacob)