Maia Sandu wants to amend the law in the Republic of Moldova so that the neighboring country can start producing interceptor drones.
The Moldovan government is preparing legislative changes to allow public-private partnerships and foreign investments in the defense industry.
"We need to start producing drones that can intercept and take down other drones. (...) I have asked the government, especially in light of recent events, to prepare the modification of the legislation.
Because, on one hand, the state needs to produce these drones and anti-drones, but on the other hand, we also need to allow the private sector.
For example, our country does not have these new technologies, we do not have experts because we have not trained such experts. But there are foreign investors who have these technologies, it's just that the law does not allow it today... There is no law that permits these public-private partnerships between the state and investors or even foreign investments. (...) We will change the law and try to attract investments, primarily to establish these public-private partnerships, but maybe we can also attract some foreign investments.
"We need to have these interceptor drones to combat the drones that are increasingly entering our country's territory and creating real dangers," said President Maia Sandu on Sunday at the "Raport" podcast.
Republic of Moldova could even turn to Ukraine, which has developed one of the most advanced drone industries, amid the Russian invasion.
"We will try to obtain technology from them to the extent that we have the capacity, because, in order to do something with that technology, you first need to create a team here with minimal expertise to work with," said Maia Sandu, as quoted by NewsMaker.
Since the beginning of the large-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, dozens of drones associated with attacks launched by the Russian Federation have flown unauthorized over the airspace of the Republic of Moldova, and some of them have crashed or exploded on the country's territory. The most recent violation of national airspace occurred on May 13, when a drone crossed the Republic of Moldova from north to south.