The "Gruppe" flew to Sicily in mid-January 1941 and attacked targets in Malta as well as British ships in the Mediterranean. On one of these missions they damaged the aircraft carrier on 16 January while she was docked for repairs in Grand Harbour, Malta. The unit was transferred to Bulgaria in early April in preparation for Operation Marita, the German invasions of Greece and Yugoslavia, where it participated in the bombing of Belgrade, Yugoslavia on 6 April. Shortly afterwards, it returned to Sicily and spent the rest of the campaign on anti-shipping missions near Southern Greece and Crete with occasional ground-attack missions. Two weeks later, on 21 April, II./LG 1 damaged the oil tanker south of Crete and unsuccessfully attacked a British convoy near Malta during Operation Tiger on 11 May.