Vessel coming from Russia dragged anchor before subsea cable damaged: Finnish police

AFP | Helsinki

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The anchor of a vessel that damaged an undersea cable linking Helsinki and the Estonian capital Tallinn dragged along the seabed “at least several tens of kilometres” before it hit the line, Finnish police said yesterday.

On December 31, police detained the Fitburg, a 132-metre-long (433-foot-long) cargo ship en route from St Petersburg, Russia, to Haifa, Israel, following suspicion that the ship’s anchor had damaged the subsea cable in the Gulf of Finland.

Finnish authorities have launched an investigation into “aggravated criminal damage, attempted aggravated criminal damage, and aggravated interference with telecommunications”. Since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, many experts and political leaders have viewed the suspected cable sabotage as part of a “hybrid war” carried out by Russia against Western countries.

“There is reason to suspect that the anchor and anchor chain of the Fitburg vessel have dragged along the seabed for at least several tens of kilometres before reaching the point of damage,” police said in a statement.

Of the vessel’s 14 crew members -- from Russia, Georgia, Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan -- a Helsinki court ordered the detention of one Azerbaijani national for one week, lead investigator Kimmo Huhta-aho told journalists after the hearing.

A Russian crew member was also placed under a travel ban after two others were subjected to the same measure.

Finnish telecoms group Elisa owns the cable, which is located in Estonia’s exclusive economic zone. Energy and communications infrastructure, including underwater cables and pipelines, have been damaged in the Baltic Sea in recent years, raising suspicions of Russian involvement.