Bulgaria’s prime minister orders further investigation into von der Leyen’s flight

SOFIA, Bulgaria (AP) — Bulgarian Prime Minister Rosen Zhelyazkov said Thursday he has ordered aviation authorities to further investigate what happened to a flight carrying European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen amid suspicions it was disrupted by GPS jamming.

The Bulgarian government has given contradictory statements in recent days about Sunday’s flight, and whether or not its GPS systems were jammed.

The European 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 this week about what exactly transpired. The plane landed safely at Plovdiv airport.

Zhelyazkov said: “During the approach of the aircraft … the GPS signal disappeared, which was reported by the pilots of the aircraft to Bulgarian air traffic control. During the conversation, a landing using the so-called ILS approach, i.e. by instruments, was proposed.”

Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova said Thursday that reports of GPS blocking by Russia were “100% made-up fake.”

Zhelyazkov said he heard what happened with the flight after the delegation disembarked and immediately ordered air traffic control and the Civil Aviation Administration (CAA) to investigate.

“On the same day, I was informed that the ground equipment had not detected any jamming at that time. However, this does not mean that no jamming was detected by the aircraft’s on-board equipment,” he said. ‘’I have instructed the CAA to contact the company operating the flight to conduct an additional check of the aircraft’s instruments and computers.”

Zhelyazkov earlier told parliament that because of Russia’s radio-electronic warfare operations based in Crimea, there are disturbances in the radio frequency spectrum in many places in Europe. “But this is not related to the specific flight,” he said.

For months, countries bordering Russia — including Finland, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia — have warned of increased electronic activity interfering with flights, ships and drones.