Moscow steps up provocation in Europe, alarming leaders there

Experts see Russia's move as probing for potential weaknesses, assessing responses

- Paul Sonne, Michael Schwirtz, Lara Jakes and Steven Lee Myers

Russia has flown drones into Poland and Romania, sent fighter jets into Estonian airspace, buzzed a German navy frigate in the Baltic Sea, and backed an aggressive shadow campaign to sway this weekend's election in Moldova.

And that's just in the past three weeks.

The frenzy of Russian action has prompted alarm in European capitals, where officials are worried that Moscow is stepping up its antagonism of Europe, as US resolve to counter Russia recedes under President Donald Trump.

The European jitters extended to Scandinavia this past week. Airports in Denmark and Norway shut down because of unexplained drone activity. Denmark's Prime Minister said she could not rule out Russia as the culprit. The Kremlin denied involvement and dismissed European concerns about the other recent episodes as "exalted hysteria".

But perhaps no country in Europe, apart from Ukraine, is feeling the spectre of Russian power at the moment more acutely than Moldova.

A parliamentary election there on Sept 28 could decide whether Moldova, a nation of 2.4 million and a former Soviet republic, continues its path to the European Union under President Maia Sandu or slips back into Moscow's orbit.

Russia has taken aim at Ms Sandu's pro-Europe party, unleashing a barrage of influence operations to undermine her government that has intensified with the approach of the vote.

Ms Sandu hit back in a dramatic speech this past week after Moldovan authorities detained 74 people and claimed to have disrupted a plot to incite unrest coordinated by criminal elements from Russia.

"The Kremlin believes we are all for sale, that we are too small to resist, that we are not a country but a territory," Ms Sandu told Moldovans on Sept 22. "But Moldova is our home, and our home is not for sale."