GPS signal interference, which has recently affected aircraft and maritime navigation near Lithuania's seaport of Klaipėda, is unlikely to stop even after the war in Ukraine ends, has warned Transport Minister Eugenijus Sabutis, calling countries in the region to take action.
“This didn't start two or three years ago – it's been happening constantly, to varying degrees,” Sabutis told BNS last week. “To think these issues will disappear once the war ends... they definitely won't. They'll continue. And believing we can just sit back and do nothing after the war – is not the answer we should be looking for”.
“We can’t expect to return to the way things were before – that world is basically gone”, he added. “Things have changed, the geopolitical landscape has shifted. So we need to figure out how to live with this reality, how to address these issues, and think ahead about how to prevent similar problems in the future”.
His comments follow a joint appeal by Lithuania and 12 other EU countries, last week, urging the European Commission to act against what they described as deliberate, systematic interference with Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) signals in the bloc's countries.
The letter to the Commission stressed that such disruptions are not accidental but part of a coordinated campaign by Russia and Belarus to destabilise regional infrastructure, particularly in the transport sector, reported BNS.
Lithuanian parliament speaker Saulius Skvernelis last week suggested that the signal jamming is aimed at shielding Russia’s Kaliningrad exclave from potential Western airstrikes and said the threat would persist as long as the Kremlin wages war in Ukraine, according to BNS.
But Minister Sabutis pushed back on the idea that the disruptions are tied solely to the conflict in Ukraine, pointing to a much longer history of electronic interference.
“Even back then, the country that Russia has now inherited – and Belarus to some extent – used equipment to jam various signals,” he told BNS, referring to Soviet-era practices of blocking foreign radio broadcasts. “There was no GPS or anything like that at the time, but they were already doing it. So to say something has changed now is a stretch. That country has never changed and it has no intention of changing”.
The joint appeal to Brussels was signed by transport ministers from Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Germany, Slovakia, Finland, Slovenia, the Czech Republic, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, Denmark and Romania.
It calls on the EU to apply all political, diplomatic and legal tools – including sanctions targeting individuals and entities involved in GNSS signal interference – to increase international pressure on the Russian and Belarusian regimes.
“Yes, right now this is just a political statement”, Sabutis acknowledged. “But with real commitment and continued work, it can turn into concrete action. I’m well aware the EU doesn’t move quickly, but if we do absolutely nothing, then nothing will ever move forward”.
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