Balloons from Belarus enter Poland's airspace for 3rd night in a row
Balloons flying from Belarus have entered the Polish airspace for a third night in a row, the Polish military reported on Feb. 2, linking the incidents to Minsk's hybrid activities.
After spotting "objects resembling balloons" on radar, Polish military and security forces quickly intercepted them and detained individuals suspected of involvement, the Polish military said, without commenting on the suspects' identities.
Similar incursions over the weekend forced a temporary airspace closure along the northern part of Poland's border with Belarus.
The Polish military reported that the incursion overnight on Feb. 2 was "noticeably smaller compared to previous nights."
"The flights of the objects were monitored and posed no threat to air traffic safety or to the citizens of the Republic of Poland," the Polish Armed Forces Operational Command said on X.
Airports across Europe were repeatedly forced to suspend operations in late 2025 due to sightings of unidentified drones.
Aerial incursions by Russian aircraft and drones also heightened tensions between NATO and Moscow, peaking in September when Polish forces shot down several Russian drones over Polish airspace.
Lithuania has seen the most Belarusian balloons enter its airspace, prompting the country to declare a state of emergency over the practice in December.
Officials in Vilnius have long attributed many of these incidents to weather balloons used by smugglers to ferry illicit cigarettes across the border from Belarus.
The Lithuanian government accuses Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko of deliberately allowing — and effectively weaponizing — the practice, describing it as part of a wider "hybrid attack" on the Baltic state.
Belarus, Russia's key ally in the region that supported the all-out invasion of Ukraine in 2022, has previously been linked to espionage and hybrid activities targeting Poland and the Baltics, including a manufactured migrant crisis in 2021.
