Sweden probes damage to Baltic undersea cables

By Ahmet Gencturk

ATHENS (AA) - Sweden has launched an investigation into the damage of two undersea communication cables in the Baltic Sea, local media reported Tuesday.

Civil Protection Minister Carl-Oskar Bohlin, speaking to public broadcaster SVT about the damaged cables—one linking Sweden with Lithuania and the other connecting Finland and Germany—said: “The government is monitoring the events very closely in view of the serious security situation and will be in contact with the authorities. It is very important to find out why two cables in the Baltic Sea are currently out of order.”

In Lithuania, Gintare Vitkauskaite-Satkauskiene from the general prosecutor’s office told the BNS news agency: “The circumstances are being clarified and information is being collected.”

Telia Lietuva, a Swedish telecommunications company operating in Lithuania, emphasized the gravity of the situation. The firm told Lithuania’s public broadcaster LRT: “It is clear that this was not an accidental dropping of one of the ship’s anchors, but something more serious could be going on.”

On Monday, Finnish national broadcaster YLE reported damage to C-Lion1, Finland’s only submarine communication cable connecting the country to Europe.