European defense ministers are holding 'drone wall' talks as airspace violations mount

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BRUSSELS (AP) — Defense ministers from European countries with borders close to Russia and Ukraine held talks on Friday about building a “drone wall” to plug gaps in their defenses following several airspace violations.

Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland have been working on a drone wall project, but in March, the European Union’s executive branch rejected a joint Estonia-Lithuania request for funds to set one up.

Since then, Europe’s borders have been increasingly tested by rogue drones. Russia has been blamed for some of the incidents, but denies that anything was done on purpose or that it played a role.

NATO jets scrambled on Sept. 10 to shoot down a number of Russian drones that breached Polish airspace, in an expensive response to a relatively cheap threat. Airports in Denmark were temporarily closed this week after drones were flown nearby.

EU Defense Commissioner Andrius Kubilius chaired Friday’s talks. The meeting, via video-link, included those countries plus officials from Bulgaria, Denmark, Hungary, Romania and Slovakia, along with representatives from Ukraine and NATO.

The aim is to establish what equipment those countries have to counter drone intrusions, what more they might need to plug any gaps along NATO’s eastern flank, and for Kubilius work out where EU funds might be found to help the effort.

The focus is on improving the detection and tracking of small and hard-to-spot drones, and coming up with a joint way to respond to any intrusions. EU leaders will discuss the meeting conclusions at a summit in Copenhagen on Wednesday.

While the effort will initially focus on the eastern flank closest to Russia and Ukraine, the commission hopes that the initiative will be taken up by other countries across the 27-nation bloc.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said earlier this month that Europe “must heed the call of our Baltic friends and build a drone wall.”

“This is not an abstract ambition. It is the bedrock of credible defense,” von der Leyen told EU lawmakers.

It should be, she said, “a European capability developed together, deployed together, and sustained together, that can respond in real time. One that leaves no ambiguity as to our intentions. Europe will defend every inch of its territory.”

Von der Leyen said that 6 billion euros ($7 billion) would be earmarked to set up a drone alliance with Ukraine, whose armed forces are using the unmanned aerial vehicles to inflict around two-thirds of all military equipment losses sustained by Russian forces.