Romanian President Nikusor Dann in an interview with the BBC did not rule out the possibility of expelling the Russian ambassador if there are more drone incidents in the country.
“This is a warning to the Russian side and I hope they will stop doing this. Otherwise, we have other measures we can take against them“, said the Romanian President.
In response to a question about what these measures include, Dann said: “For example, expelling the ambassador. This is a diplomatic hierarchy of measures.“
He reiterated that the crash of the drone into a building in Romania was the result of Ukrainian air defense operations.
A drone crashed into the roof of an apartment building in Galati, near the border with Ukraine, on the night of May 29. The explosion caused a fire in an apartment on the tenth floor, injured two people and forced the evacuation of approximately 70 local residents.
Following the incident, the Romanian Foreign Ministry summoned Russian Ambassador Vladimir Lipaev, and the Russian Consul General in Constanta, Andrei Kosilin, was declared persona non grata.
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said that Moscow's reaction to Bucharest's actions "will not be late". The Russian embassy, for its part, called the incident a provocation by Kiev, aimed at drawing NATO into a conflict with Russia.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said that the circumstances surrounding the incident with the drone on Romanian territory could only be determined after a thorough investigation.
“No one can say what origin a drone is until the wreckage is examined,“ he said. Putin suggested that the fragments of the drone be handed over to Russia for “objective investigation“.