NICOSIA, March 2 (Reuters) – Britain’s Royal Air Force base Akrotiri in Cyprus was hit by a suspected drone strike overnight, causing limited damage and no casualties, Cypriot authorities and the UK’s Ministry of Defence said.
A Cyprus government spokesperson said that “information received through various channels indicates that it involved an unmanned drone, which caused limited damage”. A security alert put out to residents in the vicinity of Akrotiri by the British bases administration advised residents to shelter in place until further notice ‘following a suspected drone impact’.
Britain retains sovereignty over the territory of two bases on the eastern Mediterranean island, which is a member of the European Union. RAF Akrotiri covers a sprawling, square-shaped peninsula on the southern tip of Cyprus. The last time it was directly attacked was by Libyan militants in the mid-1980s.
(Reporting by Devika Nair in Bengaluru and Michele Kambas in Nicosia; Editing by Himani Sarkar and Jacqueline Wong)
