BRUSSELS (Reuters) -Belgium will work to improve surveillance of its airspace following repeated sightings of drones over its airports and military bases, Defence Minister Theo Francken said on Thursday.
Belgium’s Brussels and Liege airports were closed for hours on Tuesday evening after drone sightings, diverting many incoming planes and preventing others from taking off.
“We have to be able to observe our airspace better,” Francken said after a meeting of the country’s security council to discuss the drone incursions.
A national air security centre would be operational by January 1, Francken said. If suspect drones are sighted in the meantime, “where possible we will try to take them down, we will try to jam them,” he said.
Belgium’s government will also discuss the acquisition of “counter-drone material” on Friday, he added.
NATO countries have been on high alert in recent weeks after drone sightings and other air incursions, including at airports in Copenhagen, Munich and in the Baltic region. Some 20 Russian drones entered Polish airspace in September.
Francken declined to comment on questions whether the government suspected Russia to be behind the drone incursions.
Belgian police have also been investigating drone sightings over military bases in the past week.
(Reporting by Milan Berckmans and Bart Meijer; Editing by Aidan Lewis)
