(BSS/AFP) - The discovery of an explosive drone at a German airport is being treated as a "hybrid attack scenario" that spells "a new level of danger", Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt said Wednesday.

The incident and the technology did not point "to an amateurish approach. We are dealing here with a professional hybrid threat scenario," he told journalists at Leipzig-Halle airport where police found, defused and later destroyed the drone.

"All the speculation that is currently going on about the explosives, the construction, the question of the drone, the origin and, of course, who is behind it, is now part of the investigation."

Dobrindt in June opened a so-celled Joint Centre for Countering Hybrid Threats as Germany is on high alert for espionage, sabotage and disinformation, particularly from Russia.

Speaking Wednesday, he said that "it would be short-sighted to believe that this form of threat, which objectively exists, can be combated or countered with simple measures.

"We are dealing with a competition here which may also include foreign powers. This will be part of the investigations."