German fighter plane were scrambled to intercept a Russian reconnaissance aircraft over the Baltic Sea on Tuesday, as the freshly-enlarged NATO alliance seeks to bolster its deterrence of possible aggression by Moscow in northeastern Europe.

The Russian Il-20 plane was noticed by Swedish forces, just after which two German Eurofighter plane scrambled to satisfy it, traveling out of an air base near to the German town of Laage.

The Russian aircraft flew into Swedish airspace southeast of the Blekinge spot, shut to the strategic island of Gotland.

This is a breaking story and will be up-to-date shortly.

A photo taken on July 23, 2006 demonstrates an Russian IL-20M airplane landing at an unidentified site. A Russian Il-20 intelligence plane, also referred to by its NATO reporting name, Coot-A, was intercepted by NATO…


NIKITA SHCHYUKIN/AFP by using Getty Images