SEOUL – South Korea summoned a Russian embassy official on Saturday toexpress “regrets” about the incursion of two Russian military aircraft intoSouth Korea’s air defense identification zone and to urge that it not berepeated.
South Korea said on Friday it had scrambled military aircraft to intercepttwo Russian bomber jets that flew into its air defense identification zone(KADIZ) four times that day.
The South Korean foreign ministry summoned a senior Russian diplomat and“expressed regrets and urged the incident not to happen again”, it said ina statement.
South Korea’s defense ministry called in a Russian military official andlodged a protest about the incursion.
“Russian military planes’ KADIZ entry will never help stabilize the Koreanpeninsula as well as Northeast Asia and the possibility of mid-aircollision cannot be ruled out,” the defense ministry said in a statement.
Russia’s defense ministry said on Friday that two Russian TU-95 bombersescorted by Su-35 fighter jets flew over the international waters of theSea of Japan, the Yellow Sea and the eastern part of the Pacific Ocean.
The Russian military said they were escorted by Korean F-15 and F-16fighter jets and Japanese F-2A war planes “on some stages of the route”.