The substantial government support provided to the defense sector — allocating it a 2 billion euros budget, including at the expense of other sectors — requires greater responsibility toward Latvia’s residents, Prime Minister Evika Siliņa of New Unity (JV) said in an interview with Latvian Radio while commenting on the delayed public warning following Thursday morning’s drone incident in Latgale.
Siliņa was repeatedly asked whether Defence Minister Andris Sprūds of The Progressives (P) should resign after the incident. Although the prime minister did not give a direct answer, she openly criticized the minister’s actions.
She said the government had provided very significant support to the defense and security sector, even refraining from increasing or in some cases reducing funding for several other sectors in order to prioritize defense spending.
“A 2 billion euros budget nevertheless requires the minister to understand that people will expect accountability from him,” Siliņa stated.
The head of government stressed that she certainly does not consider the handling of public warning procedures after Thursday’s drone incident to have been good or satisfactory, and that the minister is aware of this. As a result,
Siliņa said she would have a serious conversation with Sprūds in the near future.
“It is not normal that once again we are unable to properly do anything,” the prime minister said.
She added that the armed forces’ ability to respond to airspace threats by scrambling fighter jets was “good news,” but residents must not be left without timely warning regardless of who serves as defense minister.
“In any case, greater responsibility is required from the defense sector toward Latvia’s residents, considering that this funding has been granted and now they must be ready to do everything within their power, even if that means reprioritizing existing priorities,” the prime minister concluded in the radio interview.
Later on X (formerly Twitter), Siliņa announced that Sprūds had been summoned for talks on Monday, the 11th of May.
“The handling of the drone incident is unsatisfactory,” Siliņa wrote.
Already on Thursday, after a Crisis Management Council meeting, the prime minister had expressed dissatisfaction to journalists that the emergency cell broadcast message regarding the early morning drone incident at a fuel storage facility in Rēzekne was sent only after the incident had already occurred.
Later at a press conference in Rēzekne, Sprūds himself acknowledged that concerns about whether the emergency warning had been delayed were justified and that it was necessary to evaluate what had worked and what had not.
“I will also carry out such an assessment and order a review within the armed forces to determine what worked and what did not,” Sprūds promised.
At the same time, he explained that
emergency cell broadcasts are activated only after collecting “a certain body of information.”
According to him, “a large amount of information comes in every night,” and the warning system cannot realistically be activated “every minute.” He reiterated that the incident would be assessed and the relevant algorithms improved if necessary.
As previously reported, several unmanned aerial vehicles entered Latvian airspace from Russia early Thursday morning, at least one of which crashed in Rēzekne and damaged a fuel storage facility. Authorities believe another drone may have crashed in a more remote location, while a third drone reportedly left Latvian airspace.
Residents in the areas around Ludza Municipality, Balvi Municipality, and Rēzekne received emergency cell broadcast alerts on their mobile phones warning about a threat in the airspace.
The National Armed Forces of Latvia reminded the public that as long as Russia’s aggression against Ukraine continues, incidents involving foreign drones entering or approaching Latvian airspace may recur.