NATO will “strengthen its military presence in the Baltic Sea”, assured Friday December 27 the head of the Atlantic Alliance, Mark Rutte, while Finland suspects an oil ship coming from a Russian port of being there. origin of the breakdown of an electrical submarine cable connecting it to Estonia.
Mark Rutte spoke with Finnish President Alexander Stubb about this “possible sabotage of submarine cables”. “I expressed my full solidarity and support. NATO will strengthen its military presence in the Baltic Sea,” Rutte said on the social network X.
Alexander Stubb for his part affirmed on Friday that the situation was “under control”: “we must continue to collaborate vigilantly to ensure that our sensitive infrastructure is not damaged by external actors”, declared Mr. Stubb during a press conference.
“Ghost Fleet”
Four cables have been damaged in the Baltic Sea in recent days, including the EstLink 2 electricity cable, on December 25, 2024. “Significant damage has been caused to the cables,” the Finnish president said during the press conference. An investigation into “aggravated sabotage” was opened Thursday by Finnish police, and an oil tanker coming from a Russian port was boarded and escorted by a Finnish patrol boat off the coast of Porkkala, about 30 km from Helsinki.
Currently, suspicion is focused on an anchor from the Eagle S, which may have dragged it and hit the cable. The Eagle S, flying the flag of the Cook Islands and suspected of being part of a “ghost fleet” according to Finnish police, was transporting “unleaded gasoline loaded into a Russian port”.
The extent of the damage on the EstLink 2 cable is currently impossible to assess, Tuomas Rauhala, head of electrical system operations at Finnish operator Fingrid, told AFP on Friday. The cable is “out of service and can only be used for the transmission of electricity once the repairs are completed”, he added, specifying that they would take around seven months. But “it is not possible to determine (at present) what precisely needs to be repaired or what the cable looks like,” he continued. Fingrid is using electrical measurements from the coast to assess the nature and extent of the damage. “An investigation is underway, and we are awaiting more detailed results on the state of the submarine cable,” said Arto Pahkin, manager at Fingrid.