Greece demands apology from Ukraine over naval drone found near Lefkada

Greek authorities have called the incident with a naval drone near the island of Lefkada “extremely dangerous” and claim that it is Ukrainian.

The Greek government has expressed serious concern after the detection of a naval drone near the island of Lefkada in the Ionian Sea, CNN Greece reports.

According to the publication, the results of the investigation have already been submitted to the office of the Greek Prime Minister. The report contains a detailed analysis of the technical characteristics of the unmanned boat and its possible purpose.

The Minister of National Defense of Greece said that the country has actually established the origin of the device and believes “without any doubt” that it is a Ukrainian naval drone.

“Obviously, I am not going to disclose the content of the conclusions. But I must say that it was something extremely dangerous,” the minister said.

He also noted that Greek services know the type of drone, its place of manufacture and its purpose. The Greek authorities are not disclosing other details about the circumstances of the appearance of the USV off the coast of Lefkada at this time.

“If any cruise ship were heading from Venice to the Eastern Mediterranean, were on the right course and had chosen this path, then this cruise ship would have ended up at the bottom of the sea,” the minister said, referring to the risk of a drone colliding with a ship.

The Minister of Defense stated that Ukraine “owes us a very big apology. And in addition to the apology, it owes us an absolute guarantee that something like this will never happen again in the wider region.”

As a reminder, the drone was discovered by Greek fishermen off the western coast of Lefkada, after which it was handed over to the authorities. Earlier, a number of media outlets suggested that it could have been a Ukrainian Magura sea drone. At the same time, the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry stated that they had no confirmation of the device’s connection with Ukrainian operators.

The Uforce company, which deals with defense technologies, also clarified that the device found near Lefkada is not a Magura drone.