South Korea’s Ministry of National Defense summoned a senior Russian military official in Seoul on Thursday to deliver a formal protest after Russian military aircraft repeatedly entered the country’s air defense identification zone, or KADIZ.
According to the ministry, multiple Russian warplanes flew into the zone over the East Sea earlier in the day, at one point approaching within 20 kilometers of South Korean airspace. The aircraft reportedly failed to respond to multiple radio communications from Seoul.
In response, South Korea scrambled its fighter jets, deploying them to monitor and track the Russian aircraft.
This marks the eighth incursion since March 11, raising new concerns in Seoul over the frequency and nature of Russian air activity near the peninsula.
In a statement, the defense ministry said it had summoned Colonel Nikolai Marchenko, defense attaché at the Russian Embassy in Seoul, to deliver a formal protest and demand that Moscow take steps to prevent further incidents. The ministry emphasized that the repeated, unannounced flights into the KADIZ are unacceptable and risk escalating tensions in the region.
While an air defense identification zone is not recognized as sovereign airspace under international law, it is a declared area where states typically require foreign aircraft to identify themselves for security and coordination purposes.
The Joint Chiefs of Staff reported that a similar intrusion occurred just days earlier, on Saturday, when several Russian aircraft entered the zone during what appeared to be air drills. The aircraft again did not provide advance notice and failed to acknowledge South Korean attempts to communicate.
South Korean officials have not disclosed the types of Russian aircraft involved, but the pattern of repeated, uncoordinated flights has prompted renewed scrutiny of Moscow’s military posture in Northeast Asia.
Seoul maintains that it will continue to respond swiftly to any unauthorized activity in its air defense zone. The Defense Ministry reiterated its position that such actions by Russia must cease, especially amid broader geopolitical friction in the Indo-Pacific region.