BRUSSELS (AP) — The European Union on Wednesday weighed how best to respond to an attempted drone attack at a German airport blamed on Russia but struggled to find new ways to meet the challenge without resorting to military means.
The German government said Tuesday that Russia was responsible for the failed attack at Leipzig/Halle Airport on Aug. 4 using a drone laden with explosives and announced it would shut down a Russian consulate among other measures.
The nature of the incident and its attribution to Russia set a new benchmark. The drone was found near a Ukrainian cargo plane and the device was defused. The airport is a major international freight hub used for providing support to Ukraine.
“It is clear that it has all the hallmarks of state sponsored terrorism. The question is: what do we do about this,” EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas told reporters before chairing a meeting of the bloc’s foreign ministers in Ireland.
French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot said France summoned Russia’s envoy to “protest strongly” and wants to impose sanctions on more of the Kremlin’s shadow fleet ships.
“We won’t allow an act of such gravity without consequences,” Barrot said.
More than a dozen explosive devices were found
Two incidents that disrupted power distribution systems in the west and east of Germany are being investigated as possible sabotage, authorities said Wednesday, while one of them was also being examined for possible terrorism links.
Multiple explosive devices were found Tuesday morning at a substation near the Jänschwalde coal-fired power plant in Brandenburg in northeast Germany. No general power outage resulted, but only one of the devices caused short circuits, authorities said.
Brandenburg police said later on Wednesday on X that it had also launched an investigation into the formation of a terrorist organization “in conjunction with causing an explosion involving explosives and the destruction of important work equipment.”
The interior minister of Brandenburg state said that “at this time, we cannot rule out any perpetrators.”
“What we are currently experiencing is a hybrid threat, and in that regard, we cannot rule out the possibility that foreign powers are behind it,” Brandenburg Interior Minister Jan Redmann told public broadcaster ARD.
Germany is on high alert after the government on Tuesday blamed Russia for an attempted attack at Leipzig/Halle Airport on Aug. 4 using a drone laden with explosives.
More than a dozen explosive devices were found
Emergency responders were on the scene Wednesday searching the area for additional evidence, police said, leading to some road closures. Investigators were combing through the area in large groups, searching the ground for possible clues.
Officials described the explosive devices as similar to fireworks, saying that only one of more than a dozen “rocketlike objects equipped with a propellant charge” reached its target. One projectile managed to carry a cable into the high-voltage power line to establish a conductive connection to the ground, the German news agency dpa reported.
Short circuit in western Germany was caused deliberately, officials say
In a separate incident, a short circuit that caused several power lines to go out of service Tuesday evening at the Bergheim power substation near Cologne in western Germany was a deliberate act, security officials said Wednesday, adding there was no general power outage.
RWE, the company operating coal power plants at the Bergheim substation, said five coal-fired units with a combined capacity of 4,200 megawatts were taken offline after the incident.
“It wasn’t a broken switch, it was intentional. It was a criminal act,” said Herbert Reul, the interior minister of North Rhine-Westphalia state, where Bergheim is located. “We are investigating two possibilities: sabotage directed by a foreign government and left-wing extremism. We cannot rule out either possibility at this time.”
“There were bright flashes of light visible along the power lines, the overhead wires. In German, that’s called a short circuit. Several lines were affected,” Reul told reporters Tuesday night.
He added that based on the investigation's current status, “the perpetrators deliberately caused a short circuit by placing conductive material — presumably cables — over the overhead line.”
Security officials from both regions were in contact and closely checking for possible connections between the Brandenburg and Bergheim incidents, Reul said.
“Is this connected to Brandenburg, to the attacks on the railways, to hybrid threats from abroad?” Reul said in response to a question. “The answer is: We are investigating, and very thoroughly at that. But investigating is not the same as knowing, and speculation is not proof.”
Three power plants are expected to go back online later on Wednesday. Work is underway to bring the two remaining units back online by the weekend.
German power infrastructure has previously been affected under similar circumstances. Suspected left-wing extremists set fire to high-voltage lines near a power plant in southwest Berlin in January.
A struggle to find more effective options
The EU has slapped almost two dozen packages of sanctions on Russia over the war in Ukraine, hitting more than 3,000 officials, oligarchs and entities including banks, energy companies and drone makers. The EU already was preparing to impose more travel bans and asset freezes on another 1,600 people, Kallas said.
Hundreds of ships making up the shadow fleet illicitly shipping oil to fuel Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war effort have been targeted too. Russian diplomats have routinely been summoned around Europe, even expelled.
The challenge is how to respond in effective ways without going too far. EU member nations, many of them NATO allies, remain cautious about being dragged into open conflict with nuclear armed Russia.
Germany insisted it was “not at war” but had become a “daily target” of the Kremlin’s hybrid campaign. Putin dismissed the allegations, saying Berlin wants to distract from its own failings and dissatisfaction among voters. Any proof being offered “has been planted,” Putin said.
But German Foreign Minister Johan Wadephul said Berlin had carefully prepared its response “and now Russia must live with these consequences.” He called on Russia “to show that it is also ready for reasonable talks and negotiations, particularly regarding the situation in Ukraine.”
Moscow has been widely accused by Western officials of running a yearslong campaign of sabotage and disruption with the aim of undermining support for Ukraine and destabilizing European nations.
The failed attack in Germany is one of several worrying incidents reported across Europe. Recent ones include a fire this week at a major drone making factory in Poland. Russia is suspected in many cases. There have also been drone incursions in Estonia and Latvia resulting from Russia’s war in Ukraine.
Concern about Russian attempts to divide the EU
Spain has publicly accused Russia, along with Israel, of using disinformation to incite migrants to cross from Morocco into its Ceuta exclave in northern Africa. Spanish Foreign Minister José Manuel Albares accused some his EU partners of echoing that fake information, without naming them.
“There are a lot of people outside European Union that want to divide us, to make us weak,” he told reporters, clearly linking Spain's migration challenges to the incidents in Germany and elsewhere along Europe's eastern flank.
“The land borders of the south of the EU are as important as the eastern borders,” Albares said.
British Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband also attended the EU meeting, along with officials from Ukraine, Canada, Norway, Switzerland and Iceland.
“We see an attempt by Russia to divide us in Europe and to deter us from our support for Ukraine,” Miliband told reporters.
“This attempt will fail. It will fail because we will stand up to Russian aggression. We will stand shoulder to shoulder with our friends in Ukraine,” he said, for “as long as it takes for them to prevail in this conflict.”
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Associated Press writer Kirsten Grieshaber in Berlin contributed to this report.