Von der Leyen’s plane encountered Russian GPS jamming over Bulgaria

A plane carrying European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen was affected by radar jamming over Bulgaria in a suspected Russian operation, a spokesperson says.

The plane landed safely at Plovdiv airport in the country’s south-central region on Monday.

The incident was first reported by the Financial Times, which said that von der Leyen’s plane had to circle the airport for an hour.

The commission’s spokesperson Arianna Podestà said that Ms. von der Leyen would continue her planned tour of the seven European Union nations bordering Russia and Belarus.

“We can indeed confirm that there was GPS jamming,” Ms. Podestà said.

“We have received information from the Bulgarian authority that they suspect this was due to blatant interference by Russia.”

Ms. von der Leyen is a fierce critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin and Russia’s war in Ukraine.

She is on a four-day tour of the EU nations that border Russia and its ally Belarus.

“This incident actually underlines the urgency of the mission that the president is carrying out in the front-line member states,” Ms. Podestà said.

She said that Ms. von der Leyen has seen “firsthand the everyday challenges of threats coming from Russia and its proxies.”

“And, of course, the EU will continue to invest in defense spending and in Europe’s readiness even more after this incident,” she said.

Bulgaria issued a statement saying that “the satellite signal used for the aircraft’s GPS navigation was disrupted. As the aircraft approached Plovdiv Airport, the GPS signal was lost.”

Von der Leyen was scheduled to address a news conference at 2.30pm GMT in Romania on Monday.

In 2024, Russia was believed to have jammed the signal of an RAF plane carrying then-defense secretary Grant Shapps in an electronic attack described as “wildly irresponsible.”

The GPS signal of the plane was said to have been interfered with for half an hour while it passed the Russian territory of Kaliningrad, which sits between Poland and Lithuania.

The defense secretary was aboard an RAF Dassault 900LX Falcon jet, named Envoy, on the way back from Poland when the attack took place.