{"id":218863,"date":"2026-09-07T19:43:16","date_gmt":"2026-09-07T19:43:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/218863\/"},"modified":"2026-09-07T19:43:16","modified_gmt":"2026-09-07T19:43:16","slug":"eus-top-diplomat-warns-europe-could-wake-up-unprepared-after-afd-victory","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/218863\/","title":{"rendered":"EU’s top diplomat warns Europe could \u2018wake up\u2019 unprepared after AfD victory"},"content":{"rendered":"

Kaja Kallas has warned that growing support for parties which minimise the Russian threat could leave Europe unable to defend itself. She also said Russia\u2019s approaching State Duma elections could bring further provocations on EU soil.<\/p>\n

The European Union\u2019s top diplomat Kaja Kallas said that Germany\u2019s democratic choice had to be respected following the AfD\u2019s landslide victory in Saxony-Anhalt<\/a>. However, she expressed concern that parties which were \u201cblind\u201d to the security threat and claimed it was not Europe\u2019s concern were gaining ground. She did not explicitly name the AfD in that part of her response.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m just afraid that we might wake up in a situation where we haven\u2019t done enough to be able to deter the threats and defend ourselves,\u201d she said during a visit to Lithuania on Monday.<\/p>\n

Lithuanian Prime Minister Mindaugas Sinkevi\u010dius called the German result a \u201cwake-up call\u201d for established parties. However, he said it would not fundamentally change relations between Lithuania and Germany. Berlin remains one of Lithuania\u2019s most important security partners and leads a NATO brigade stationed in the country.<\/p>\n

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Russian attacks move further west<\/p>\n

Ms Kallas placed her warning about political support in the context of increasingly frequent Russian hybrid activity across Europe. She pointed to the attempted drone attack at Leipzig-Halle Airport, which German authorities attributed to Russia.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWith Russia\u2019s parliamentary elections approaching, we must be ready for further provocations on European soil,\u201d she said after the meeting. \u201cWe are likely to see more attacks like the one in Leipzig.\u201d<\/p>\n

During the joint press appearance<\/a>, Mr Sinkevi\u010dius called for greater EU funding for countries facing hybrid attacks. He highlighted airspace violations, sabotage and migration organised through Belarus. \u201cRussia is testing our resolve and seeking to intimidate us into backing away from our support for Ukraine,\u201d he later wrote on Facebook<\/a><\/p>\n

We might wake up in a situation where we haven\u2019t done enough to be able to deter the threats and defend ourselves.
\u2014 Kaja Kallas, EU foreign policy chief<\/p>\n

He described the EU\u2019s eastern flank as Europe\u2019s first line of defence but stressed that the threat extended beyond the Baltic region and required a united European response.<\/p>\n

Ms Kallas backed faster implementation of Eastern Flank Watch, an EU initiative intended to strengthen surveillance and defence along the bloc\u2019s borders with Russia and Belarus. She argued that Lithuania\u2019s experience should help shape the programme.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Kaja Kallas has warned that growing support for parties which minimise the Russian threat could leave Europe unable…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":218864,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[140],"tags":[5083,97897,17414,30741,442,6099,89605,329,36223],"class_list":["post-218863","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-kaja-kallas","tag-afd","tag-eastern-flank-watch","tag-european-security","tag-hybrid-attacks","tag-kaja-kallas","tag-lithuania","tag-mindaugas-sinkevicius","tag-russia","tag-saxony-anhalt"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@people\/117231472593835459","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218863","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=218863"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218863\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/218864"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=218863"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=218863"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=218863"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}