By Andrew Gray and Andreas Rinke
BRUSSELS/BERLIN, Sept 2 (Reuters) – European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen vowed on Wednesday to increase pressure on Russia, including with new sanctions, after an attempted drone attack at Leipzig/Halle Airport in Germany that she said showed Moscow’s growing “recklessness”.
Airport workers last month found a drone laden with explosives and a detonator at the airport, an important civilian freight and NATO logistics hub in eastern Germany that is also a base for several giant Ukrainian Antonov An-124 cargo planes.
Germany blamed Moscow for the attack, characterising it as part of hybrid warfare meant to intimidate and cause divisions in countries that have rallied around Ukraine since Russia’s 2022 invasion.
Russia denies involvement. It says it will respond to what its foreign ministry spokesperson called “anti-Russian action”, and summoned Germany’s top diplomat in Moscow.
“Europe and NATO will not just maintain our pressure on Russia; we will increase it, and we will not stop – not until Russia stops bombing and killing innocent children, men and women in Ukraine,” von der Leyen said in Brussels after a meeting with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte.
“Europeans are faced with the hard truth that this is the new normal. We have to step up, and that means being ready to respond to Russia’s recklessness faster and better.”
The full scope of new sanctions was not immediately clear.
EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said the bloc was working on sanctions related to Russia’s military complex, and France’s foreign minister called for action against Russia’s so-called “shadow fleet” of ships accused of circumventing energy sanctions.
Rutte said more drones and missiles had crossed into NATO airspace on Europe’s eastern flank, and there was an increase in malign activities including the Leipzig attack.
“If Russia thinks we will be divided by the threat, or if they think we will be deterred from supporting Ukraine, they are mistaken,” he said.
The EU and several EU member states summoned Russian embassy officials. Germany said it would close Russia’s consulate general in Bonn and terminate its agreement with the Russian House cultural centre in Berlin.
TWO SUSPECTS IDENTIFIED, MEDIA OUTLETS SAY
Details of two Leipzig attack suspects were reported by German media outlets Sueddeutsche Zeitung, NDR and WDR.
Investigators have identified the logistics coordinator and instructor behind the attack, the outlets reported.
The man, Russian-born but holding a Latvian passport, was believed to have ties to Russian intelligence, they said. He is thought to have flown into Berlin in late July and driven a rental car towards Leipzig. Two days before the failed drone attack, the suspect left Germany by plane, they reported.
The second suspect was a man from Belarus who also holds a Russian passport and is thought to have entered the country on an Italian tourist visa obtained in Minsk, the outlets said.
Germany’s Public Prosecutor General did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Russia also did not immediately comment further on the case.
GERMANY PROBES SABOTAGE CASES
As the EU prepared its response, Germany was grappling with two new suspected sabotage cases within 24 hours.
In the first, authorities were investigating vandalism at a substation in the western state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) that prompted lignite power plant units with 4,200 megawatts (MW) in combined capacity to go off the grid.
In the other, also on Tuesday, devices carrying conductive material damaged power lines at one of the most critical high-voltage nodes in the eastern state of Brandenburg.
NRW’s interior minister said the work of foreign powers or left-wing extremists could not be ruled out.
Brandenburg’s interior minister, Jan Redmann, said there appeared to be parallels between the attacks but that investigations were at an early stage.
The incidents come at a sensitive time as the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), which calls for closer ties to Moscow, is topping polls before a state election this weekend.
Lawmaker Alexander Throm, an interior policy expert from Germany’s ruling conservatives, said it was striking that such incidents were occurring before elections.
“The clear goal is to unsettle the public. Of course, that is a goal shared not only by Russia but also by others, such as left-wing extremists,” Throm told Reuters.
(Additional reporting by Bart H. Meijer, Padraic Halpin, Conor Humphries, John Irish, Dominique Vidalon, Charlotte Van Campenhout, Lili Bayer, Christoph Steitz, Matthias Inverardi and Miranda Murray; Writing by Matthias Williams; Editing by Sudip Kar-Gupta and Timothy Heritage)
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