Reports: Chinese ship is main suspect in cutting of two Baltic Sea undersea telecom cables

by WorldTribune Staff / 247 Real News November 19, 2024

A Chinese vessel is the top suspect in the cutting of two undersea telecommunications cables in the Baltic Sea, reports say.

The C-Lion1 and BCS subsea data cables in the Baltic Sea, connecting Finland and Germany as well as Sweden and Lithuania, were damaged on Sunday and Monday.

According to Danish authorities, the Chinese bulker Yi Peng 3 is the top suspect as it traveled over the reported incident sites at the times of the failures, GCaptain.com reported on Tuesday.

German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius has said damage to two undersea cables in the Baltic Sea looks like an act of sabotage and a “hybrid action”, without knowing who is to blame.

A 1,170km telecommunications cable between Finland and Germany was severed in the early hours of Monday, while a 218km Internet link between Lithuania and Sweden’s Gotland Island stopped working on Sunday.

The foreign ministers of Germany and Finland said in a joint statement: “The fact that such an incident immediately raises suspicions of intentional damage speaks volumes about the volatility of our times. A thorough investigation is underway. Our European security is not only under threat from Russia‘s war of aggression against Ukraine, but also from hybrid warfare by malicious actors. Safeguarding our shared critical infrastructure is vital to our security and the resilience of our societies.”

A similar event occurred in 2023 when the Balticonnector between Finland and Estonia was damaged. Chinese container vessel NewNew Polar Bear was later found to have dragged its anchor across the pipeline.

After initial stonewalling by Chinese authorities, Finnish officials launched their own investigation and eventually found that the pipeline’s damage was caused by NewNew Polar Bear. Like Yi Peng 3, NewNew Polar Bear had departed from a Russian port prior to the incident.


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