Norway on Saturday has said that it had arrested a Russian national carrying a drone & camera equipment after he was seen capturing photos of an airport in the far north, the second such arrest in a week.
Norway is on high alert after reports came out of mysterious drone sightings close to offshore oil as well as gas drilling platforms run by the significant energy producer.
Previous month’s Nord Stream gas pipeline blasts in the Baltic Sea are widely assumed to be because of sabotage.
The 51-year-old Russian man, whose name was not revealed, was detained Friday on suspicion of flying a drone in Norway, to which he confessed.
Meanwhile, Police in the northern town of Tromso said in a statement, “Police have confiscated a huge amount of photography equipment, including a drone & a cache of memory cards.”
The confiscated material which included photographs of another airport in the northern town of Kirkenes and the Norweigian military’s Bell helicopters, it added.
Tromso police said that, “Norway’s Police Security Service has been called in on the investigation.”
The Scandinavian nation, along with several other Western countries, has forbidden Russians and Russian entities from overflying its territory after the February 24 invasion of Ukraine.
Breaking that restriction is punishable by a 3-year jail term.
Norwegian Police on Friday said they had arrested another Russian who was caught crossing the border in the far north at beginning of this week as he returned home with two drones and a cache of photos and videos.
That man, named 50-year-old Vitaly Rustanov, was detained at the border post of Storskog, the only transit point between Norway & Russia.
Rustanov further admitted flying drones “across the whole country” but refused of any wrongdoing, & was on Friday placed in provisional custody for two(2) weeks.