By Andrius Sytas and Johan Ahlander
Stockholm/Vilnius (Reuters) -An underwater fiber optic cable between Latvia and Sweden was damaged on Sunday, probably due to external influence, Latvia said, prompting NATO to deploy patrol ships to the area and trigger a sabotage investment by sabotage authorities.
Sweden’s security service has seized control of a ship as part of the probe, the country’s prosecutors said.
“We are now carrying out a number of specific investigative measures, but I cannot delve into what they are due to the ongoing preliminary investigations,” senior prosecutor Mats Ljungqvist said in a statement.
NATO coordinated military ships and aircraft under its recently deployed mission, dubbed “Baltic Sentry.” The effort follows a series of incidents in which power cables, telecommunications links and gas pipelines were damaged in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
Latvian Prime Minister Evika Silina said her government had coordinated with NATO and other countries in the Baltic Sea region to clarify the circumstances surrounding the latest incident.
“We have determined that there is most likely external damage and that it is significant,” Silina told reporters after an extraordinary government meeting.
Latvia’s navy said earlier on Sunday it had dispatched a patrol boat to inspect a ship and two other vessels were also being examined.
Up to several thousand merchant ships make their way through the Baltic Sea at any given time, and some of them passed the broken cable on Sunday, data from the Marine Traffic Ship Tracking Service showed.
One such vessel, the Malta-flagged bulk carrier Vezhen, was accompanied to Swedish waters by a Swedish Coast Guard vessel on Sunday evening, Marinetaffic data showed. It later anchored in front of the Swedish naval base at Karlskrona in the south of Sweden.
It was not immediately clear whether the Vezhen, which crossed the fiber optic cable at 0045 GMT on Sunday, was being investigated.
A Swedish coast guard spokesman declined to comment on the Vezhen or the position of the coast guard ships.
Navigation maritime Bulgarian Bulgarian Shipping Company, which listed the Vezhen among its fleet, did not immediately respond to requests for comment outside of office hours.
NATO cooperation
Swedish navy spokesman Jimmie Adamsson previously told Reuters it was too early to say what caused the damage to the cable or whether it was intentional or a technical error.
“NATO ships and aircraft are working with national resources from Baltic Sea countries to investigate and take action if necessary,” the alliance said in a statement on Sunday.
Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristsonsson said his country was working closely with NATO and Latvia.
NATO said last week it would deploy frigates, patrol aircraft and naval drones in the Baltic Sea to protect critical infrastructure and reserve the right to act against ships suspected of posing a security threat.
Finnish police seized a tanker carrying Russian oil last month and said they suspected the ship had damaged the Finnish-Estonian Estlink 2 power line and four telecommunications cables by dragging its anchor along the seabed.
In a statement from Finland, the recent cable damage highlighted the need to increase protection for critical underwater infrastructure in the Baltic Sea.
The cable that broke on Sunday connected the Latvian city of Ventspils to Sweden’s island of Gotland and was damaged in Sweden’s exclusive economic zone, the Latvian navy said.
Communications providers were able to switch to alternative transmission routes, the cable’s operator, Latvian State Radio and Television Center (LVRTC), said in a statement, adding that it was attempting to embark a ship for repairs.
“The exact nature of the damage cannot be determined until cable repairs begin,” LVRTC said.
A spokesman for the operator said the cable was laid at depths of more than 50 meters (164 feet).
Unlike gas pipes and seabed power cables, which can take many months to repair after damage, fiber cables that have suffered damage in the Baltic Sea have generally been restored within a few weeks.
