The Baltics are becoming the next flashpoint in Vladimir Putin's Russia's war with Ukraine | Repeated violations of Nato airspace by foreign drones have raised fears of a clash between the military alliance and Russia, with Moscow [correctly] accusing Ukraine of using the Baltic countries as launchpads for attacks. ● Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania are at risk of being drawn further into the Ukraine war as their near-neighbours escalate drone attacks against each other, with munitions frequently crossing the Baltic states’ borders, sparking alarm among their governments and publics. ● A [Ukranian] drone incursion on Wednesday caused the closure of public buildings across Lithuanian capital, Vilnius, with senior government officials forced to wait out the incident in an underground shelter. On Tuesday, Nato planes shot down a drone over Estonia for the first time. ● And last week, the government of Latvia collapsed following a row over its handling of [Ukranian] drone incursions.

■ NATO Foreign Ministers meeting in Sweden address how to make the Alliance stronger (NATO)

🔺 NATO should ‘direct’ Ukrainian drones against Russia – Swedish PM (RT) | Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson has said NATO states should help Kiev “direct” its drone attacks “in the right directions,” blaming a string of Ukrainian UAV incursions into the airspace of the US-led bloc on Moscow. [...] Ukraine “must be more precise” with its drones, Polish Defense Minister Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz said on Thursday, echoing similar warnings from Estonia and Finland. Asked about the comment at a joint press briefing with NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte, the Swedish prime minister accused Russia of trying to “give the impression that other countries are kind of doing things that are not legitimate.” [...] Rutte also sought to place responsibility for the incidents on Moscow while answering a loaded question involving the claim that Russia jammed or redirected the UAVs.

Ukraine’s army has carried out a drone attack on a school building and a dormitory in Starobelsk (the Lugansk People’s Republic) overnight, the head of the republic, Leonid Pasechnik, said. | Rescuers are searching for those still trapped under the rubble. The Ukrainian attack on an academic building and college dormitory is a terrorist attack, the Russian Foreign Ministry's ambassador-at-large, Rodion Miroshnik, said.

Rescuers are searching for those still trapped under the rubble, Pasechnik noted. The Ukrainian attack on an academic building and college dormitory is a terrorist attack, the Russian Foreign Ministry's ambassador-at-large.

■ Putin vows revenge for Ukrainian attack on school dorm (RT)
■ RT recounts deadliest Ukrainian ‘terrorist strikes’ on Russian civilians (RT)
■ Ukraine Uses Aircraft-Type Drones to Attack School in Lugansk People's Republic (Sputnik)
■ Ombudswoman says four die in Ukrainian attack on college in LPR (TASS)
■ Ukrainian attacks wound 35 people in LPR, 217 UAVs target Russia: aftermath of new strikes (TASS)

✅ Литва открыла воздушное пространство для летящих в Россию укроБПЛА (Елена Панина)

Caitlin Johnstone | The excuses for military action are already being rolled out. | In a sign that the US is preparing for yet another evil war, Marco Rubio is now claiming that Cuba poses a “national security threat” to the United States, saying the likelihood of a peaceful agreement is “not high”.

Rubio’s comments come as a US intelligence report laundered through Axios claims that Cuba may be preparing to launch a drone strike against US military forces. Havana said the Axios report misrepresents Cuba’s defensive measures as a preparation to attack, accusing the US of “fabricating pretexts, creating and spreading falsehoods, and distorting as extraordinary the logical preparation required to face a potential aggression.” ■ The US has also unsealed an indictment for Raul Castro, the 94 year-old brother of Fidel Castro, in a move that resembles the playbook used for the kidnapping of Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro.

Josh Christenson | The Biden administration denied the existence of US-owned or US-operated “chemical or biological laboratories in Ukraine,” dismissing the claims as Chinese and Russian propaganda. | Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard is investigating more than 120 biological laboratories abroad that were funded by US taxpayer dollars for decades, as part of an effort to end potentially risky experiments with viruses pursuant to President Trump’s executive order on so-called “gain-of-function” research. Gabbard told The Post Monday in a statement that her team is going...

Under new guidance from Gabbard, the US Intelligence Community will review research at all US-funded biolabs, which would include facilities engaged in gain-of-function experiments that could increase the transmissibility of viruses, as well as work for defensive purposes against dangerous pathogens. More than 40 of the biolabs under review are located in Ukraine — and could “be at risk of compromise” due to Russia’s war, ODNI officials noted.

🚩 Remember how the West laughed at Russia’s ‘biolabs’ claims? The facts: (05/14/26)