For at least three years, the European Commission has quietly been monitoring “unidentified anomalous phenomena” (UAP), formerly known as UFOs, Euronews reported Monday, and the outlet also carries pilot accounts of incidents over Greece and Cyprus.
The report cites a reply that the Commission’s Defense department sent to two amateur astronomers in Malaysia, a father and son, who had sent Brussels images of 37 UAPs they spotted in the sky and space using their telescope.
The Malaysian pair wrote that they had also picked up various signals from above, through the Wi-Fi frequencies of local networks.
In its reply, the European Commission said it had no jurisdiction over incidents concerning Malaysia. It added that it is improving at spotting and identifying UAPs as its technological capabilities advance, though it still needs to get better. According to Euronews, the letter suggests Brussels is tracking such phenomena more actively than has been officially disclosed.
The two Malaysian astronomers appear to be Anamalai Muthu and his son Aarav Anamalai, who had also contacted NASA, ESA, and other space agencies in 2022, the same year they reached out to the Commission. The pair had told The Vibes at the time that NASA had encouraged them to expand and document their observations.
The term UAP was introduced by the U.S. Department of Defense in August 2020, when Washington created the UAP Task Force to look into unexplained incidents in restricted airspace.
The issue gained more serious attention after a 2017 New York Times report revealed that Pentagon files contained UFO footage recorded during military flights. Although there’s no evidence these phenomena are extraterrestrial or advanced hostile drones, the U.S. government now asks its military personnel not to hesitate in reporting such incidents, which could pose a potential threat to national security.
Recently, the Trump administration appointed a Scientific Council on UAP, headed by Harvard astronomer Avi Loeb, known for his provocative claims about alien spacecraft in the Solar System.
In Europe, the debate centers on possible risks to air traffic. According to Euronews, France is the only EU country with a dedicated, state-funded center for tracking and investigating UFOs: GEIPAN (Groupe d’Études et d’Informations sur les Phénomènes Aérospatiaux Non Identifiés), the Study and Information Group on Unidentified Aerospace Phenomena.
Since its founding in 1977, GEIPAN has reviewed more than 3,300 UAP cases, of which 106 have been classified as unexplained. Another 1,014 cases remain unresolved due to insufficient data.
On June 29, the French Parliament held a significant debate on UFOs, focusing on the work done by GEIPAN and the French Air and Space Force, as well as the possibility of cooperating with the U.S. to secure “answers from public authorities.” French lawmaker Arnaud Saint-Martin told Le Parisien that the goal is to move past sensationalism and fantasy and instead address, seriously and rationally, an issue that draws significant public interest.
Euronews maintains that the EU is watching UFOs, though it notes that despite repeated calls for a standard UAP reporting procedure, the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) said it already has a framework in place for reporting any incident that could affect aviation safety, including UAPs. EASA told Euronews that pilots and other aviation staff are encouraged to report anything they consider a potential safety risk, regardless of its nature, adding that for now it has found no evidence that UAP reports point to a systemic aviation safety issue requiring additional measures.
UFOs Over Mykonos and Cyprus
Euronews also spoke with European pilots who say they’ve encountered unexplained phenomena.
Christiaan van Heijst, 43, a Boeing 747 captain with more than 20 years of experience, described four incidents he witnessed between 2005 and 2010.
One happened late at night over Greece in 2005, most likely near the island of Mykonos. The Dutch pilot said that after a night landing, as they turned around on the runway, they saw a bright light in the sky at an extremely high altitude. It moved briefly, vanished, reappeared, covered roughly the same distance, and vanished again, about three times. He said that before it appeared, the light had been about twice as far away, then suddenly shot off at an instant, incredible speed with no acceleration, simply gaining speed instantly and disappearing from view. Van Heijst noted that that same night, the aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt’s strike group was crossing the Mediterranean en route to the Persian Gulf, ahead of the second Gulf war, a detail that had appeared in the airspace closure notices (NOTAMs) among others; he said it isn’t known whether the events are connected.
A second incident over Cyprus was described by Rob Ackermans, a pilot for a Dutch airline who says he’s seen several UFOs. He said that in 2023, he and another pilot, along with four cabin crew members, were on a flight from the Middle East to the Netherlands. Starting around 19:30 UTC, they watched a strange phenomenon for more than two hours that struck them as truly remarkable, with all six crew members observing it from the cockpit. It began while they were south of Cyprus: on a bearing of exactly 300 degrees magnetic north, at an elevation angle of about 25 to 30 degrees, and at very high altitude, they saw a light suddenly flare brightly, then slowly fade. This kept happening more and more often, frequently with one or two additional lights that also flared and faded. He said the strangest part was that one of the three lights sometimes maneuvered around the others, resembling a chase, what air forces call dogfighting, after which two or all three would vanish again. They initially assumed it might be some military operation over the Balkans, but when they reached the Balkans themselves, they saw the same display still in the same direction, at the same angle, and at very high altitude. After around 21:30 UTC, the lights suddenly vanished at incredible speed and were never seen again. Ackermans added that the next day, one of his colleagues spotted the same phenomenon from his garden back home in the Netherlands.
