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France Deploys Three Rafale Fighter Jets to Help Protect Polish Airspace, Macron Says 

Polish soldiers walk below as firefighters work on the destroyed roof of a house, after Russian drones violated Polish airspace during an attack on Ukraine, with some being shot down by Poland with the backing from its NATO allies, in Wyryki-Wola, Lublin Voivodeship, Poland, September 10, 2025. (Reuters)
Polish soldiers walk below as firefighters work on the destroyed roof of a house, after Russian drones violated Polish airspace during an attack on Ukraine, with some being shot down by Poland with the backing from its NATO allies, in Wyryki-Wola, Lublin Voivodeship, Poland, September 10, 2025. (Reuters)
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France Deploys Three Rafale Fighter Jets to Help Protect Polish Airspace, Macron Says 

Polish soldiers walk below as firefighters work on the destroyed roof of a house, after Russian drones violated Polish airspace during an attack on Ukraine, with some being shot down by Poland with the backing from its NATO allies, in Wyryki-Wola, Lublin Voivodeship, Poland, September 10, 2025. (Reuters)
Polish soldiers walk below as firefighters work on the destroyed roof of a house, after Russian drones violated Polish airspace during an attack on Ukraine, with some being shot down by Poland with the backing from its NATO allies, in Wyryki-Wola, Lublin Voivodeship, Poland, September 10, 2025. (Reuters)

France will deploy three Rafale fighter jets to help Poland protect its airspace after this week's drone incursions into its airspace, French President Emmanuel Macron said on Thursday on X.

"The security of the European continent is our top priority. We will not give in to Russia's increasing intimidation," he said.

A French military official said the warplanes had already been deployed to Poland prior to Tuesday's incursions.

There can be no mistake with such a large-scale attack on Poland, a Polish official said in response to US President Donald Trump suggestion that an incursion by Russian drones on might have been accidental.

"I think this is a message that should reach President Trump today: there's no question of a mistake - this was a deliberate Russian attack," deputy defense minister Cezary Tomczyk told local TV broadcaster Polsat News.

Early on Wednesday, Poland shot down drones in its airspace with the backing of military aircraft from its NATO allies, the first time a member of the Western military alliance is known to have fired shots during Russia's war in Ukraine.

Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski, who visits Kyiv on Friday, also responded to Trump's words. "On the night that 19 Russian drones crossed into Poland, 400 (drones) plus 40 missiles crossed into Ukraine. These were not mistakes," he said in a video posted on X.

At Poland's request, the UN Security Council will meet in New York on Friday. The meeting will begin at 1500 local time, Polish foreign affairs ministry said.

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World

German Military Creates Rapid Response Teams to Counter Drone Threats

A sign with a drone ban is displayed outside the airport in Munich, Germany October 6, 2025. REUTERS/Angelika Warmuth/File
A sign with a drone ban is displayed outside the airport in Munich, Germany October 6, 2025. REUTERS/Angelika Warmuth/File
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German Military Creates Rapid Response Teams to Counter Drone Threats

A sign with a drone ban is displayed outside the airport in Munich, Germany October 6, 2025. REUTERS/Angelika Warmuth/File
A sign with a drone ban is displayed outside the airport in Munich, Germany October 6, 2025. REUTERS/Angelika Warmuth/File

The German military is setting up rapid response teams to counter acute drone threats, a top German military official said, most recently dispatching these experts to assist in Belgium.

"These anti-drone units are being established right now," Lieutenant General Alexander Sollfrank, who heads Germany's joint operations command and oversees the country's defence planning, told Reuters in an interview.

The German defence ministry said late on Thursday it was sending counter-drone experts to Belgium after a request from the country, which has been struggling with an increase in drone sightings near military installations and civilian airports.

DRONE SIGHTINGS CAUSE HEADACHES ACROSS EUROPE

"An advance party of air force personnel have arrived in Belgium to explore the situation and coordinate a temporary mission involving drone detection and counter-drone capabilities with the Belgian forces," the ministry said in a statement.

"The main party will follow shortly."

Sightings of drones over airports and military bases have become a constant problem in Belgium in recent days and have caused major disruptions across Europe in recent months.

They forced the temporary closures of airports in several countries including Sweden on Thursday.

Some officials have blamed the incidents on "hybrid warfare" by Russia. Moscow has denied any connection with the incidents.

Sollfrank declined to go into detail when talking about the new counter-drone units, citing operational security, but said a team sent to Copenhagen last month during an EU summit had been equipped with a mix of sensors and effectors.

"They have various systems to spot and counter drones. We have the option, for example, to assume control over a drone and land it at a specific location," said the general.

The counter-drone experts also have drones at their disposal that can eject nets to catch drones and thus take them down, as well as interceptors that ram hostile drones, he added.

BELGIUM AIRPORTS LATEST TO SPOT DRONES

Belgium's Liege airport resumed flights after a temporary halt due to a drone sighting on Friday, in the second such incident this week.

Drones spotted flying over airports in the capital, Brussels, and in Liege, in the country's east, forced the diversion of many incoming planes and the grounding of some due to depart on Tuesday.

The Belgian government called an emergency meeting of key government ministers and security chiefs on Thursday to address what the defence minister called a coordinated attack.

World

Iran's Pezeshkian Says Tehran Seeks Peace, But Will Not Bow to Coercion

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian visits the Iranian Atomic Energy Organisation in Tehran, Iran, November 2, 2025. Iranian Atomic Organisation/WANA (West Asia News Agency)/Handout via REUTERS
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian visits the Iranian Atomic Energy Organisation in Tehran, Iran, November 2, 2025. Iranian Atomic Organisation/WANA (West Asia News Agency)/Handout via REUTERS
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Iran's Pezeshkian Says Tehran Seeks Peace, But Will Not Bow to Coercion

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian visits the Iranian Atomic Energy Organisation in Tehran, Iran, November 2, 2025. Iranian Atomic Organisation/WANA (West Asia News Agency)/Handout via REUTERS
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian visits the Iranian Atomic Energy Organisation in Tehran, Iran, November 2, 2025. Iranian Atomic Organisation/WANA (West Asia News Agency)/Handout via REUTERS

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said on Friday that Iran seeks peace, but will not be coerced into abandoning its nuclear and missile programs, state media reported. US President Donald Trump said on Thursday that Iran had been asking if US sanctions against the country could be lifted.

"We are willing to hold talks under international frameworks, but not if they say you can't have a (nuclear) science, or the right to defend yourself (with missiles) or else we will bomb you," Pezeshkian said, Reuters reported.

Iran has repeatedly dismissed the possibility of negotiations over its defensive capabilities, including its missile program, and the idea of abandoning all enrichment of uranium on its soil.

"We want to live in this world in peace and security, but not be humiliated, and it is not acceptable that they impose upon us whatever they want and we just serve them," Pezeshkian said.

Israel sees Iran as an existential threat. But Iran says its ballistic missiles, with a range of up to 2,000 km (1,200 miles), are an important deterrent and retaliatory force against the United States, Israel and other potential regional targets. It denies seeking nuclear weapons.

World

Four Arrested after Protesters Disrupt Israeli Concert in Paris

A view shows streets Rue Ferdinand Flocon, one of the pedestrianized streets, ahead of the March 23 citywide vote on a proposition from city hall to pedestrianize 500 streets, in Paris, France, March 21, 2025. (Reuters)
A view shows streets Rue Ferdinand Flocon, one of the pedestrianized streets, ahead of the March 23 citywide vote on a proposition from city hall to pedestrianize 500 streets, in Paris, France, March 21, 2025. (Reuters)
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Four Arrested after Protesters Disrupt Israeli Concert in Paris

A view shows streets Rue Ferdinand Flocon, one of the pedestrianized streets, ahead of the March 23 citywide vote on a proposition from city hall to pedestrianize 500 streets, in Paris, France, March 21, 2025. (Reuters)
A view shows streets Rue Ferdinand Flocon, one of the pedestrianized streets, ahead of the March 23 citywide vote on a proposition from city hall to pedestrianize 500 streets, in Paris, France, March 21, 2025. (Reuters)

Four people were arrested after protesters used flares to disrupt a concert by the Israeli Philharmonic Orchestra in Paris on Thursday night, the latest in a wave of anti-Israel incidents linked to the Gaza conflict, French officials said on Friday.

In footage posted on social media, protesters were seen lighting flares and chanting pro-Palestinian slogans in La Philharmonie concert hall in northern Paris as some audience members and security personnel tried to remove them.

Despite the chaos and several interruptions, the concert went ahead after the protesters were evacuated, Reuters reported.

"I strongly condemn the actions committed last night during a concert at the Philharmonie de Paris. Nothing can justify them," Interior Minister Laurent Nunez said on X.

"I thank the personnel from the Paris police who enabled the rapid arrest of several perpetrators of serious disturbances inside the venue and contained the demonstrators outside. Four people have been placed in custody," he added.

The Paris prosecutor's office said three women and a man were in custody, on charges ranging from violence, destruction and organising an unauthorised protest.

Culture Minister Rachida Dati on X condemned the disruptions as going against the "fundamental rights of our Republic."

The Philharmonie said it had filed a criminal complaint.