Poland to change rules for shooting down airspace violators

The Polish Ministry of National Defence plans to change procedures for shooting down objects that violate the country’s airspace, Polish Deputy Minister of Defence Cezary Tomczyk announced.

"In the coming days, the Ministry of National Defence will change the procedures for Polish aircraft and helicopters to open fire on targets entering our airspace from Russia," Tomczyk said.

According to him, the Polish Ministry of Defence will replace the standard peacetime requirement for visual identification with what is known as "positive identification."

In military aviation, positive identification means determining that a detected object is a specific target, such as an enemy aircraft or an object illegally violating airspace, without requiring the pilot to identify it visually.

The change comes amid continued Russian aircraft activity near NATO’s eastern flank, with the Alliance urging member states to strengthen air patrols and the readiness of their forces. NATO officials have said they are closely monitoring the situation and are prepared to respond to violations of member states’ airspace.

Under the revised procedures, Polish fighter jets will be able to respond more quickly to drones and missiles entering Polish airspace from Russia.

Currently, a decision to open fire can only be made after visual identification, meaning that a pilot must approach the target and determine precisely what the object is.

Once the procedures for authorising the use of force are revised, radar surveillance data will be sufficient for the pilot or operational commander to make the decision to open fire.

By Vafa Guliyeva