The Russian Embassy in Bucharest reacted to the explosion of the marine drone in the Port of Constanța, stating that the device belongs to Ukraine and rejecting any attempt to attribute responsibility for the incident to Russia.
In a press release sent on Friday, the Russian diplomatic representation claims that the information communicated so far by the Romanian authorities has been „intentionally incomplete” and asserts that both the drone that exploded in the port and three other drones drifting towards Romanian territorial waters are unmanned maritime vehicles used by Ukraine.
According to the Russian Embassy, these drones are used by the authorities in Kiev "to commit terrorist acts against civilian ships and to create threats to the safety of navigation in the Black Sea."
The Embassy categorically denies any link between the incident and the Russian Federation.
"Any attempts to directly or indirectly associate these drones with Russia and to attribute responsibility to it for the incident in question are without any basis," the Russian Embassy's statement said.
A powerful explosion occurred on Friday morning at 10:28 in the Port of Constanța, where thousands of people work daily. The explosion, heard and seen by locals, happened after a marine drone was found in the Dana 78 area four hours earlier (around 6 a.m.), and the authorities were alerted.
The Ministry of National Defense officially announces that the drone self-detonated, fortunately without causing any casualties.
An alert was issued for the population in the area via Ro-Alert, but only at 11:22, nearly an hour after the explosion.
The Head of the Department for Emergency Situations, Raed Arafat, explained that when authorities realized the drone could explode, the respective area was evacuated. The Ro-Alert message was sent because there might be other dangerous drones in the water, which intervention teams are currently searching for from helicopters.
To date, the Romanian authorities have not officially announced the origin of the drone or the conclusions of the ongoing investigation.
The Ministry of National Defense and other involved institutions continue their investigations to determine the circumstances under which the device reached the port area and exploded.