Germany’s defense minister said Tuesday that officials assume damage to two data cables under the Baltic Sea, one of which terminates in Germany, was caused by an act of sabotage, although he said they have no proof at present.
The damage was discovered on Monday in the C-Lion1 cable, which runs about 1,200 kilometers from the Finnish capital Helsinki to the German port city of Rostock. Another cable between Lithuania and Sweden was also damaged.
Speaking in Brussels, German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius said that Russia poses not only a military threat, but also a hybrid one, and that Europe needs to take a broad approach to defence. He said the damage to the two cables was “a very clear sign that something was afoot.”
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“No one believes that these cables were accidentally cut, and I also don’t want to believe the narratives that it was the anchors that accidentally damaged these cables,” he told a regular meeting of EU defense ministers.
“So we have to announce – without knowing concretely where it comes from – that this is a hybrid work. “We also have to assume – without knowing it clearly – that this is an act of sabotage.”
The Foreign Ministries of Finland and Germany said on Monday evening that the damage raised suspicions that it was a sabotage operation.
They said in a joint statement that the damage comes at a time when “our European security is threatened not only by Russia’s aggressive war on Ukraine, but also by the hybrid war waged by malign actors.”
The statement said that countries were investigating the incident, and that it was important to protect this “vital infrastructure.”
& Edition 2024 The Canadian Press
