Particle.news
Download on the App Store

Bavaria's Interior Minister Presses Landtag for Drone-Defense Funding and Staff

A planned update to the police powers law would clarify countermeasures including potential shoot-downs.

Overview

  • Joachim Herrmann urged lawmakers to approve additional money and personnel, calling the drone threat real and cross-border.
  • The state cabinet has endorsed an expansion of capabilities, including a new police drone competence and defense center planned in Erding.
  • Officials are preparing amendments to the Polizeiaufgabengesetz to provide clearer legal authority for countering drones, including potential shoot-downs and arming interceptor drones.
  • Police leader Kerstin Schaller cautioned that many reported sightings cannot be verified and said the origin of early October incidents near Munich Airport remains unclear.
  • Military support would be constrained to cases of catastrophic danger, as the Bundeswehr stressed it cannot take on routine domestic drone-defense roles.