A NATO air base in the German city of Geilenkirchen has raised its security level “based on intelligence information indicating a potential threat,” the base said Thursday evening.
“All non-essential mission staff have been sent home as a precautionary measure,” the base said in a statement on the social media platform X without elaborating. “The safety of our staff is our top priority. Operations continue as planned.”
A spokesman for the base in Geilenkirchen said the alert level had been raised to Charlie, the second-highest of four alert levels. Charlie is described as “an incident has occurred or intelligence has received that some form of terrorist action against NATO or its members is likely to occur.”
This is the second time that the base hosting NATO's AWACS surveillance aircraft fleet has had its security level increased following an incident last week, when a military base in nearby Cologne was temporarily closed while authorities investigated possible sabotage of the water supply there.
On the same day, the base in Geilenkirchen also reported a break-in attempt, prompting a thorough search of the area.
Regarding the alleged sabotage at the Cologne base, the German military later declared everything safe, saying that tests showed the tap water there was not contaminated.
NATO has warned in the past about hostile Russian activity, including acts of sabotage and cyberattacks. Russia has repeatedly accused NATO of threatening its security.
In July, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said the Western military alliance was seeing an evolving pattern and that recent attacks were the result of increasingly active Russian intelligence.
Several incidents in NATO territory have been deemed suspicious by analysts in recent years, including the severing of a vital undersea cable connecting Svalbard to mainland Norway in 2022. (uh/ka/rs)
