POLITICO
BRUSSELS — The European Commission on Monday proposed four key defense projects — including a drone wall to block Russian aerial aggression.
The nine-page document was distributed to member countries ahead of an informal meeting of EU leaders in Copenhagen on Wednesday, where they will discuss defense and how to further support Ukraine.
The leaders are meant to reach an agreement on political guidance to Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and top EU diplomat Kaja Kallas, who have been asked to present a roadmap on boosting EU defense at another leaders’ summit later in October.
In addition to the drone wall, the document mentions three other projects: the Eastern Flank Watch, which aims to detect threats ranging from hybrid operations to drone incursions; the Air Defence Shield, a collaborative effort by EU and other European nations to enhance air and missile defense capabilities; and the Defence Space Shield, which aims to keep the bloc competitive in space domain awareness to monitor threats.
The leaders meeting takes place after drones violated Polish, Romanian, Danish and Norwegian air space in the past weeks and Russian jets were escorted out of Estonian territory. Because of that, the Commission writes that the drone wall and the Eastern Flank Watch “require special urgency and should be moved forward expediently.”
