Vilnius Airport in Lithuania announced today that it has resumed operations after being temporarily shut down twice overnight due to balloons moving toward its airspace, causing several incoming flights to be diverted to other cities.

European civil aviation has repeatedly faced serious problems in recent months following sightings and intrusions of unmanned aerial vehicles (drones) into airspace, including at airports in Copenhagen and Brussels. The temporary shutdown of Vilnius Airport was the ninth such incident carried out by the capital’s airport since the beginning of October.

Lithuania says these problems were caused by weather balloons transporting smuggled cigarettes from neighbouring Belarus and accuses Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko of allowing this practice, which it describes as a form of “hybrid attack”.

“Airspace restrictions were lifted on 24 November at around 03:25,” local time and Greek time, the airport said today in a Facebook post.

Late yesterday, Sunday, the airport had announced that its operations were disrupted due to “characteristic indications of balloons moving towards Vilnius Airport” and that it was expected to reopen at 01:30 local time and Greek time today.

However, it later announced that it had once again imposed temporary restrictions at 01:40 local time and Greek time due to balloons moving towards its airspace.

Lithuania last month closed both border crossing points with Belarus in response to the balloon incidents, but announced their reopening last week as air traffic disruptions appeared to have ceased.

Lukashenko described the border closure as a “crazy scam”, accusing the West of waging a hybrid war against Belarus and Russia and launching a new era of the Iron Curtain.