Romania probes drone-like aircraft

Sucheava (Romania): Romanian prosecutors say they have opened a criminal file after an "unmanned aircraft" was discovered in the northern county of Bistrita-Nasaud.

"So far, the origin of the aircraft has not been established, and its owner has not been identified," prosecutors in Cluj County said. "An investigation is underway to determine the circumstances in which the aircraft was flown and to identify the pilot of the aircraft." Bistrita County police told The Associated Press that the drone-type aircraft was found by a young man in a field near his house.

It comes days after a Russian-made unmanned aircraft crossed Romania and Hungary before entering Croatia and crashing late on Thursday into a field near a student dormitory, damaging some 40 cars. No one was injured. Meanwhile, activists in Poland have been blocking Russian and Belarusian trucks in an effort to prevent them from crossing the Belarusian border with medicines, food and spare parts for the Russian military. Belarus is allied with Russia. Activists fear that the goods will help reinforce the Russian military as it intensifies its war against Ukraine. Tomasz Grodzki, the speaker of the opposition-controlled Senate, criticised Poland's right-wing government for allowing the trucks to continue to cross Poland into Belarus. "I am disgusted by the lack of sanctions by our government," Grodzki said, in comments carried by the Polish news agency PAP on Monday. However, a ruling party spokesman, Radoslaw Fogiel, said Poland was expecting the European Union to close off the transport to Russia and Belarus.

In the meantime, the UN refugee agency chief Filippo Grandi arrived in Afghanistan on Monday saying despite the raging war in Ukraine and the more than 2.7 million refugees flooding into Europe, Afghanistan, with its millions of internal refugees, has not been forgotten. "All of you are following what is happening in Ukraine. It is a very big crisis and also refugee crisis," Grandi said upon his arrival in the Afghan capital.