"The GPS in the entire area went out," one source said. The pilot circled the airport for an hour before deciding to land manually using maps."There was an undeniable disruption (of the GPS signal)," he added.

Lavrov came to the summit in a USSR sweatshirt

The disruption was confirmed by the Bulgarian air traffic control authority and subsequently by the European Commission. “Since February 2022, there has been a significant increase in GPS signal interference and, more recently, signal spoofing,” the Bulgarian authority said. “These disturbances affect the accurate reception of the GPS signal, leading to various operational problems for both aircraft and ground systems,” it added.

"We can indeed confirm that there was a GPS signal disruption, but the plane landed safely in Bulgaria. We have received information from the Bulgarian authorities that they suspect that the incident was caused by clear Russian interference," said a spokeswoman for the commission. She added that it was a charter flight to Plovdiv. Whether it was targeted precisely because the head of the EU executive was on board is something that needs to be asked of those behind the attack, Podesta added.

GPS jamming and spoofing, which block access to the satellite navigation system, has traditionally been used by the military and intelligence services to defend sensitive locations. But it is now increasingly being used by countries such as Russia to disrupt normal civilian life in neighboring countries, the Financial Times noted. The Baltic states warned last year that the GPS jamming, which Russia is accused of, could cause a plane crash.

Von der Leyen is now on a four-day trip to EU countries bordering Russia and Belarus."This incident has further underlined the urgency of the Commission President's trip to frontline countries," Podesta said. In Latvia, Finland, Estonia, Poland, Lithuania, Bulgaria and Romania, the EU executive chief is mainly responsible for defence and security and"has the opportunity to see first-hand the daily threats coming from Russia and its allies," the spokeswoman added.

Bulgarian authorities issued a statement saying that “the satellite signal used for the aircraft’s GPS navigation was disrupted.” “As the aircraft approached the airport in Plovdiv, the GPS signal was lost,” they added. As noted by the Bulgarian daily Trud, journalists present at the scene were informed that the flight was delayed. However, this was justified by unsuitable weather conditions. “Putin has not changed and will not change. He is a predator. He can only be stopped by strong deterrence,” von der Leyen subsequently declared at a press conference in Bulgaria.