The Secretary General of NATO, Mark Rutte, explained this Friday that he has spoken with the Finnish president, Alexander Stubb, about the investigation carried out by his country into the “possible sabotage” of submarine cables in the Baltic Sea and has announced that the Alliance will increase its military presence there. He did so with a message through his social networks, in which Rutte also expressed his “total solidarity and support” for the affected countries.
The Finnish Border Guard detained on Thursday and escorted to Finnish territorial waters an oil tanker that was in the area when an electrical link between Finland and Estonia was cut this Wednesday, according to local media. According to the Border Guard, the anchors of the Eagle S vessel were not in place, which has raised suspicions among authorities. Officials said that based on the preliminary investigation, there is reason to believe that the ship’s anchor caused the damage.
“Too early to say why, but we know who did it”
Later, the Finnish president, Alexander Stubb, indicated this Friday that it is still too early to rule on the reasons behind the breakage of five submarine cables in the Gulf of Finland that occurred last Wednesday, although he said that it can be said that the The cause was the oil tanker Eagle S. “It is still too early to draw conclusions about why this happened, but we know who did it,” Stubb said in a press conference after meeting with the Committee of Foreign Ministers and Security to discuss the affair.
The Finnish president has kept the main international actors informed, both in the European Union (EU) and NATO, and has spoken with the Secretary General of the Alliance, Mark Rutte, among others. “We have talked that we must increase surveillance and we must do it jointly. “We have also discussed how to better protect our common European infrastructure,” said Stubb.
In this sense, the leader stated that both Finland and Estonia have asked NATO to increase its presence in the region, especially around critical infrastructure, after the numerous incidents in recent months.
Regarding one of these incidents, the Secretary General of NATO, Mark Rutte, also spoke the day before with the Estonian Prime Minister, Kristen Michal, whose country has also opened an investigation to try to clarify who was responsible for the alleged sabotage of the submarine cables in the Baltic Sea. “NATO stands in solidarity with allies and condemns any attack on critical infrastructure. “We are following the investigations from Estonia and Finland and prepared to provide further support,” Rutte said Thursday on his social media.
The suspicious ship, part of the Russian “shadow fleet”
The European Union also published this Thursday a statement on the situation in the Baltic after the latest incident that occurred this week against electrical and data cables in the Baltic Sea, which especially affects Finland, Estonia and Germany. The European Commission and the High Representative for Foreign Policy of the EU, Kaja Kallas, said in a joint statement that they are working with the Finnish authorities in the investigation of the latest incident that has affected an underwater electrical cable in the Baltic Sea and expressed his “condemnation” of the “deliberate destruction” of critical infrastructure in Europe.
The EU statement also specifies that the suspicious ship is part of the Russian “shadow fleet”, “which threatens security and the environment, while financing Russia’s war budget.” In this context, they indicated that the Twenty-seven will propose “more measures, including sanctions, against this fleet.”
In this statement, Brussels reiterates its commitment to “guarantee the resilience and security of our critical infrastructure” and emphasizes that currently “there is no risk to the security of the electricity supply in the region.”
Estlink 2 had already broken down earlier this year, but the new incident has raised suspicions of possible sabotage after damage was detected in two underwater data cables in the Baltic Sea last month.
Source: www.eldiario.es
