Sweden Detains Ship In Latest Baltic Cable Damage Incident

Sweden launches probe into latest incident of suspected Baltic undersea cable sabotage, detains Malta-flagged vessel

Swedish authorities have opened an investigation into suspected aggravated sabotage and seized a ship following damage on Sunday to an underwater fibre-optic cable in the Baltic Sea from Latvia to the Swedish island of Gotland.

The incident comes less than a month after NATO launched a new mission in the Baltic in response to repeated attacks on underwater power and telecoms cables, some of which have been blamed on Russia.

Swedish police, country’s coast guard and armed forces are involved in the investigation, the country’s National Security Unit said.

A Malta-flagged vessel, the Vezhen, was being detained in the Swedish port of Karlskrona, the coast guard said.

‘Significant’ damage

“We are directly on site with the seized ship and are taking measures as decided by the prosecutor,” Coast Guard spokesman Mattias Lindholm told the newspaper Expressen.

The ship left the Russian port of Ust-Luga several days earlier and was navigating between Gotland and Latvia at the time the damage was suspected to have occurred, according to data from Vesselfinder.

Latvia’s state broadcaster, LVRTC, which owns the cable, said it had detected disruption to transmission over the cable on Sunday.

“At the moment, there is reason to believe that the cable is significantly damaged and that the damage is caused by external influences,” LVRTC said in a statement.

Latvian prime minister Evika Silina said the government was working with Sweden and NATO on the investigation.

Images published in Swedish media showed that the Vezhen appeared to have a damaged anchor.

Undersea damage

Bulgarian shipping company Navigation Maritime Bulgare, which listed the Vezhen in its fleet, said on Monday that one of the ship’s anchors had dropped to the sea floor in high winds and that no malicious intent had been involved.

A number of incidents in the Baltic last year were linked to Russia’s “shadow fleet”, tankers of unclear ownership that continue Russia’s oil exports in defiance of sanctions.

Earlier in January NATO launched the “Baltic Sentry” mission using frigates, maritime patrol aircraft and naval drones to provide enhanced surveillance and deterrence to protect undersea cables and pipelines in the region.