NATO will deploy advanced spy aricrafts over Lithuania to monitor Russia's military activities in a mission scheduled to last several weeks, the war coalition said on Thursday, adding that 150 military personnel will be stationed in the Eastern European country to support the operation.

“NATO will temporarily deploy Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) surveillance planes to Šiauliai, Lithuania. The first of two aircraft will arrive on Thursday (28 September 2023) and will fly missions to monitor Russian military activity near the Alliance’s borders,” the statement read.

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“Our AWACS can detect aircraft and missiles hundreds of kilometres away, making them a key early warning capability for NATO," the alliance's Spokesperson Dylan White said. "This is an important contribution to our shared security.”

Reconnaissance flights over Alliance territory will start in the coming days, the statement added, noting that the AWACS planes belong to a fleet of 14 NATO-owned surveillance aircraft based in Geilenkirchen, Germany.

Data on the Flightradar24 portal revealed earlier that the United States and its NATO allies have tripled the number of reconnaissance flights near Crimea since the beginning of this year.

These numbers indicated a direct a connection between the intensity of flights of Western reconnaissance aircraft and the intensity of strikes by the Ukrainian armed forces on Crimea.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova said on Wednesday that the US and the UK, using NATO spy hardware and in cooperation with other Western countries, were involved in the recent Ukrainian attack on Sevastopol, which resulted in heavily damaging the Russian Black Sea Fleet headquarters.

Largest drills since the Cold War

Earlier this month, NATO announced that it will be conducting in Spring 2024 what was considered the coalition's largest military exercises since the Cold War. The primary focus of these exercises is to simulate the defense against a hypothetical Russian attack on a member state.

The drills set for Spring, titled "Steadfast Defender," will involve the participation of the organization's joint command, alongside approximately 41,000 military personnel.

The event will span across several European nations, including Germany, Poland, and the Baltic countries, and will see between 500 and 700 air combat simulations involving over 50 aircrafts.

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