European defense ministers agree to press on with 'drone wall' project as airspace violations mount

BRUSSELS (AP) — European defense ministers agreed on Friday to develop a “drone wall” along their borders with Russia and Ukraine to better detect, track and intercept drones violating Europe’s airspace.

The decision comes after a spate of incidents in which Europe’s borders and airports have been tested by rogue drones. Russia has been blamed for some of them but denies that anything was done on purpose or that it played a role.

“Russia is testing the EU and NATO, and our response must be firm, united and immediate,” EU Defense Commissioner Andrius Kubilius said after chairing a virtual meeting of 10 countries on Europe’s eastern flank. Ukrainian and NATO officials also took part in the talks.

Kubilius said the drone shield could take a year to build, and that envoys from the countries would meet soon to develop “a detailed conceptual and technical roadmap” on the way ahead. The top priority is an “effective detection system,” he said.

The drone wall is likely to be discussed by EU leaders at a summit in Copenhagen next week, and later again in October when they meet in Brussels. Kubilius said that Europe’s defense industry would also be brought onboard.

“Today’s meeting was a milestone – now we focus on delivery,” he said.

Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland have been working on a drone wall project, but in March, the European Commission, the EU's executive branch, rejected a joint Estonia-Lithuania request for funds to set one up.

Things have changed this month, though.

NATO jets scrambled on Sept. 10 to shoot down a number of Russian drones that breached Polish airspace, in an expensive response to a relatively cheap threat. Airports in Denmark were temporarily closed this week after drones were flown nearby.

“The hybrid war is ongoing and all countries in the European Union will experience it,” Polish Defense Minister Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz told reporters in Warsaw after the drone wall talks. “The threat from the Russian Federation is serious. We must respond to it in a very radical manner.”

He urged all EU partners to get involved in the project, saying that the incidents at Danish airports in recent days made it clear that “the threat is not only to the eastern flank, that the launch of drones may occur from a ship or vessel that is nearby.”

On Thursday, in a social media post addressed to the nation, Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said the drone incidents in her country were part of a new reality facing Europe, in which hybrid attacks were fiercer and more frequent.

She said that Danish authorities still have not determined who was behind the incidents, but that Russia was currently the primary threat to European security.

Neighboring Sweden has offered to loan Denmark a military anti-drone system ahead of the two summits involving dozens of EU leaders in Copenhagen next week, Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson told broadcaster TV4.

He said the system has the capability to “shoot down drones.” It was not immediately clear whether Denmark accepted the offer.

The 27 EU leaders meet on Wednesday, with the drone security threat likely to be high on their agenda. They will be joined by more than a dozen other leaders for a European Political Community summit on Thursday.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said earlier this month that Europe “must heed the call of our Baltic friends and build a drone wall.”

“This is not an abstract ambition. It is the bedrock of credible defense,” von der Leyen told EU lawmakers.

It should be, she said, “a European capability developed together, deployed together, and sustained together, that can respond in real time. One that leaves no ambiguity as to our intentions. Europe will defend every inch of its territory.”

Von der Leyen said that 6 billion euros ($7 billion) would be earmarked to set up a drone alliance with Ukraine, whose armed forces are using the unmanned aerial vehicles to inflict around two-thirds of all military equipment losses sustained by Russian forces.

Claudia Ciobanu in Warsaw and Stefanie Dazio in Berlin contributed to this report.

A mobile radar installation is seen at the Danish military site on Amager, Pionegaarden, near the village of Dragoer and on the coast of Oresund, the sea between Denmark and Sweden, on Friday, Sept. 26, 2025. (Steven Knap/Ritzau Scanpix via AP)

EU Commissioner for Defence and Space, Lithuanian Andrius Kubilius, right and Finnish Defence Minister Antti Hakkanen take part in a press conference, at the Ministry of Defence in Helsinki, Finland, Friday, Sept. 26, 2025. (Markku Ulander /Lehtikuva via AP)

General view of Aalborg Airport in Denmark, Thursday, Sept. 25, 2025, after drones were observed on the airport on Wednesday evening and the night to Thursday, and the airspace over the airport was closed. (Bo Amstrup/Ritzau Scanpix via AP)

Ukrainian soldiers prepare to launch an Avenger UAV drone in Ukraine's Kharkiv region, Wednesday, Sept. 24, 2025. ( AP Photo/Yevhen Titov)

FILE - An engineer watches a Ukrainian-made quadcopter drone at an undisclosed location in Ukraine, June 12, 2025. (AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky)

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado comes to the White House on Thursday to discuss her country's future with President Donald Trump even after he publicly dismissed her credibility to take over after an audacious U.S. military raid captured then-President Nicolás Maduro.

Trump has raised doubts about his stated commitment to backing democratic rule in Venezuela. His administration has signaled its willingness to work with acting President Delcy Rodríguez, who was Maduro’s vice president and, along with others in the deposed leader’s inner circle, remains in charge of day-to-day governmental operations.

In endorsing Rodríguez so far, Trump has sidelined Machado, who has long been a face of resistance in Venezuela and sought to cultivate relationships with Trump and key administration voices like Secretary of State Marco Rubio among the American right wing in a gamble to ally herself with the U.S. government.

The White House says Machado sought the face-to-face meeting with Trump without setting expectations for what would occur. Her party is widely believed to have won 2024 elections rejected by Maduro. Machado previously offered to share with Trump the Nobel Peace Prize she won last year, an honor he has coveted.

Machado plans to have a meeting at the Senate following her lunch with Trump, who has called her “a nice woman” while indicating they might not touch on major issues in their talks Thursday.

Her Washington swing began after U.S. forces in the Caribbean Sea seized another sanctioned oil tanker that the Trump administration says had ties to Venezuela. It is part of a broader U.S. effort to take control of the South American country’s oil after U.S. forces seized Maduro and his wife at a heavily guarded compound in the Venezuelan capital of Caracas and brought them to New York to stand trial on drug trafficking charges.

The White House says Venezuela has been fully cooperating with the Trump administration since Maduro’s ouster.

Rodríguez, the acting president, herself has adopted a less strident position toward Trump and his “America First” policies toward the Western Hemisphere, saying she plans to continue releasing prisoners detained under Maduro — a move thought to have been made at the behest of the Trump administration. Venezuela released several Americans this week.

Trump, a Republican, said Wednesday that he had a “great conversation” with Rodríguez, their first since Maduro was ousted.

“We had a call, a long call. We discussed a lot of things,” Trump said during an Oval Office bill signing. “And I think we’re getting along very well with Venezuela.”

Even before indicating the willingness to work with Venezuela's interim government, Trump was quick to snub Machado. Just hours after Maduro's capture, Trump said of Machado that “it would be very tough for her to be the leader. She doesn’t have the support within or the respect within the country.”

Machado has steered a careful course to avoid offending Trump, notably after winning last year’s Nobel Peace Prize, which Trump wanted to win himself. She has since thanked Trump. Her offer to share the peace prize with him was rejected by the Nobel Institute.

Machado’s whereabouts have been largely unknown since she went into hiding early last year after being briefly detained in Caracas. She briefly reappeared in Oslo, Norway, in December after her daughter received the Nobel Peace Prize on her behalf.

The industrial engineer and daughter of a steel magnate began challenging the ruling party in 2004, when the nongovernmental organization she co-founded, Súmate, promoted a referendum to recall then-President Hugo Chávez. The initiative failed, and Machado and other Súmate executives were charged with conspiracy.

A year later, she drew the anger of Chávez and his allies again for traveling to Washington to meet President George W. Bush. A photo showing her shaking hands with Bush in the Oval Office lives in the collective memory. Chávez considered Bush an adversary.

Almost two decades later, she marshaled millions of Venezuelans to reject Chávez’s successor, Maduro, for another term in the 2024 election. But ruling party-loyal electoral authorities declared him the winner despite ample credible evidence to the contrary. Ensuing anti-government protests ended in a brutal crackdown by state security forces.

Garcia Cano reported from Caracas, Venezuela, and Janetsky from Mexico City. AP Diplomatic Writer Matthew Lee in Washington contributed to this report.

FILE - U.S. President George Bush, right, meets with Maria Corina Machado, executive director of Sumate, a non-governmental organization that defends Venezuelan citizens' political rights, in the Oval Office of the White House, Washington, May 31, 2005. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak, File)

FILE - Opposition leader Maria Corina Machado gestures to supporters during a protest against President Nicolas Maduro the day before his inauguration for a third term, in Caracas, Venezuela, Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Ariana Cubillos, file)