The Irish Army has invested in “very sophisticated bullets” ahead of this summer’s EU Presidency, amid huge concern about the security of European leaders. 

Ireland takes over the EU Presidency this July and Dublin will see a steady stream of visits from European leaders and officials. 

It means security around Dublin Castle will be high over the next few months, with officials especially concerned about the potential of drones to disrupt EU events. 

“We've seen these drone incursions in various EU countries, including in Denmark during its hosting of the presidency when they shut down the airport,” Irish Times Crime and Security Correspondent Conor Gallagher told The Claire Byrne Show. 

“We saw a similar incident in Dublin Bay last December, when Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky was visiting Ireland and drones were spotted in Dublin Bay by an Irish Naval Service crew.”

Mr Gallagher said, in particular, the drone sighting during Zelenskyy’s visit “focused minds” on the potential risks posed to EU leaders. 

“The Defence Forces are devising this anti-drone doctrine, which will obviously be for the presidency as well,” he said. 

“But would also form a key part of Irish military operations at home and abroad going forward, especially in peacekeeping missions.”

A drone. Picture by: Alamy.com.

As part of their preparations for the presidency, the Defence Forces have been trained in so-called ‘hard kill solutions’ and ‘soft kill solutions’ for drone incursions. 

“A soft kill solution is jamming drones,” Mr Gallagher explained. 

“So, there's all sorts of technology you can get, which will jam the radio signal, which controls the drone and basically disable it or force it to land. 

“And those systems are being installed at Casement Aerodrome.” 

However, if all else fails, the Army will shoot a drone down. 

“Some modern drones can be controlled by artificial intelligence and don't actually need to be controlled by the ground,” he said. 

“Some others can be controlled by very long fibre optic wires and jamming or soft killing just doesn't work against them - so, you need to have what they call a ‘hard kill solution’ as well as a backup.

“That's shooting them out of the sky using various types of weapons - and so they have been training troops in air gunnery.”

A ‘No Drone Zone’ sign at Dublin Airport. Picture by: PA Images / Alamy

New ‘airburst ammunition’ has been bought, which is considered safer to use in areas around civilians. 

“It's basically very sophisticated bullets that can kind of detonate in the air near their target and kind of take out the target,” Mr Gallagher said.

“That mitigates the risk of those rounds landing, say, somewhere where it could cause danger to civilians.”

Security officials have also warned there will likely be an increase in cyberattacks and misinformation from hostile actors during the presidency. 

“The goal is to embarrass Ireland, to expose and exploit fractures within the EU,” Mr Gallagher said. 

“So, there's a lot of stuff going on behind the scenes to mitigate that.”

Main image: An Irish soldier. Picture by: Alamy.com.