VILNIUS — European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen accused Russia on Tuesday of deliberately triggering recent drone alerts in the Baltic states as a tactic to unsettle European democracies, while conceding the episodes had revealed weaknesses in regional air-defence and civil-alert systems.
Speaking in Vilnius alongside the presidents of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia, von der Leyen described the alerts — which forced residents into shelters, closed schools and disrupted transport — as a return to a wartime reality for civilians on Europe’s eastern flank. A week earlier, Lithuanian authorities ordered people to head to bunkers after a brief drone alert in the capital, the first such public alarm there since Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine.
“These are not isolated incidents. This is a deliberate strategy from Russia, trying to destabilise our democratic societies,” she said, adding that the pattern mirrored Moscow’s broader efforts to unsettle Europe. Von der Leyen also warned the tactic could spread farther west, saying, “What you are experiencing today, the rest of Europe could face tomorrow.”
The spate of alerts has coincided with intensified Ukrainian strikes on targets near Russia’s Saint Petersburg region, prompting Baltic governments to accuse Moscow of misdirecting or manipulating incidents to create panic. Although the alerts have so far caused no casualties or significant damage, they exposed the limits of existing air-defence measures and the inability to intercept every drone.
Von der Leyen promised stepped-up EU action to address the challenge, highlighting plans for more unified alert systems and improved cross-border coordination to shore up civil-defence capacities and reduce vulnerabilities across member states.