UK planes scramble to intercept suspected Russian jets

By Ahmet Gurhan Kartal

LONDON

British fighter jets were scrambled on Wednesday to investigate suspected Russian jets near the U.K. airspace, the Defense Ministry said.

"Typhoon fighters ... were scrambled today as a precautionary measure against a potential incursion into U.K. area of interest by one or more unidentified aircraft," a spokesman for the Ministry of Defense said, according to local media.

"At no time was there a threat to U.K. airspace," he added.

Tensions between the U.K. and Russia have been running high since the alleged nerve-agent attack on former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter in Salisbury.

Britain's Minister of State for the Armed Forces Mark Lancaster had said in June that the Royal Air Force had to scramble jets more than 80 times over the last 10 years to intercept Russian military aircraft.

British and French fighter jets were scrambled in September to intercept Russian jets over the North Sea.