The crash took place overnight Thursday-Friday, injuring two people and triggering a fire, Romanian officials said. Romania said the drone was Russian and Nato countries have condemmned Russia.

“I just learned, before entering this hall, that something happened with what was supposedly our drone,” Putin told a press conference in the Kazakh capital Astana.

“No one can say the origin of this or that aircraft until an examination of that aircraft is conducted,” he said.

“If they provide us with any objective data… in that case, will we assess what happened.”

Putin said “Russia has never threatened and is not threatening European countries” in response to accusations made by Romania and its Nato allies.

Putin said European countries sought to “continue the confrontation with Russia and to justify exorbitant spending from their state budgets”.

Russia’s ambassador to Romania was summoned to the foreign ministry and told that the Russian consul general in the city of Constanta would be expelled and consulate closed, the Russian embassy said in a Telegram message.

“No explanation has been provided as to how Romanian experts determined the drone’s nationality,” the embassy said, accusing Ukraine of a “new provocation” aimed at “trying by all means to draw Nato into a war against Russia”.

Drone incursions in Romania have been detected dozens of times since the start of Russia’s 2022 conflict with Ukraine, but Friday’s strike marked the first time a residential building in the country had been hit.