Spanish defence minister's plane hit by GPS 'disturbance' over Russian enclave

A Spanish military jet with the defence minister on board suffered a GPS "disturbance" on Wednesday while flying over the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad, the government said.

The A330 jet was en route to Lithuania on Wednesday morning and was flying above Kaliningrad when the incident happened, according to Spain's defence ministry.

Spanish Defence Minister Margarita Robles was on the flight, which was travelling to the Siauliai air base in Lithuania — which is part of NATO's air policing mission. Also onboard were relatives of Spanish troops deployed to the base and journalists, local media reported.

Robles appeared at a press conference after arriving in Lithuania with her Lithuanian counterpart, Dovilė Šakalienė. "Under no circumstances will they break the will of Spain or any of the countries of the Atlantic alliance to continue working for peace and coexisting in peace," she said.

Robles defended "the right of all of us to travel and fly freely throughout European territory without interference from everyone knows who, as we experienced this morning."

For her part, Šakalienė explained that many civilian aircraft have been suffering similar jamming attacks for several weeks. "We have to be aware that the threat is real," Šakalienė emphasised.

The apparent attempt to disrupt the plane's GPS did not affect the flight, as the aircraft receives signal from a military satellite, according to Spanish newspaper El Mundo.

Dozens of such incidents have been recorded and blamed on Russia by Western officials since Moscow's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

This year, Nordic and Baltic nations — including Estonia, Finland, Latvia and Lithuania — have repeatedly warned about greater electronic interference from Russia disrupting communications with planes, ships and drones.

While Moscow has claimed that the jamming is defensive — to protect cities and military infrastructure from Ukrainian drone attacks — Baltic officials say the depth of electronic interference has increased, causing navigation failures far from Russia’s borders.

Earlier this month, Bulgarian Prime Minister Rosen Zhelyazkov ordered aviation authorities to further probe what happened to a flight carrying European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen amid suspicions it was disrupted by GPS jamming.

The Commission said von der Leyen's plane lost its satellite GPS signal over Bulgaria in a suspected Russian operation, and has maintained its position as questions have grown about what exactly transpired. The plane landed safely at Bulgaria's Plovdiv airport.