The German Defense Minister, Boris Pistorius, doubted this Tuesday that the cutting of an important telecommunications cable that connects his country with Finland and which became known this Monday was an accident and has dropped his suspicion that it was damaged. deliberately. The C-Lion 1 fiber optic cable, which connects the Finnish capital (Helsinki) with the German city of Rostock across the Baltic Sea, has a length of almost 1,200 kilometers and runs partially along the same route as the Nord Stream gas pipeline. .
“We have to assume that it was sabotage,” said the Social Democratic politician after a meeting with his EU counterparts in Brussels. Although there is still no evidence of this, as he himself has acknowledged, “no one believes that these cables were cut by mistake.” “That is why we have to deduce – without knowing exactly who the author is – that it is a hybrid action,” he added.
It is not the only cable damaged in the last few hours. On Monday night, the breakdown of another of these infrastructures, between Lithuania and Sweden, became known, which has been left completely inoperative. This second incident has reduced data transmission capacity by a third, forcing traffic to be diverted to other underwater connections. Although less forceful than the German Government, the authorities of the Baltic country have stated that they do not rule out that it is the product of sabotage. The Swedish police are also investigating him as such.
Regional members of the Lithuanian Army are jointly analyzing both incidents, a spokesperson for the Lithuanian army confirmed.
Research underway
In a joint statement, German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock and her Finnish counterpart Elina Valtonen reported that a thorough investigation is being carried out into what happened to the infrastructure that connects both countries, but “the fact “That such an incident immediately raises suspicion of deliberate harm says a lot about the volatility of our times.”
“Our European security is threatened not only by Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine, but also by the hybrid war of malicious actors,” the joint statement continued. “Protecting our common critical infrastructure is crucial for our security and the resilience of our societies.”
Just over a year ago, in October 2023, another undersea telecommunications cable – in this case, between Sweden and Estonia – was damaged. At that time, and in the same area, the Balticconnector gas pipeline also, according to the Finnish authorities.
External influence
Finnish technology company Cinia, which operates the infrastructure, announced that the C-Lion1 submarine cable between Germany and Finland had been cut for unknown reasons. The defect was discovered on Monday. Due to the damage, the services provided through the cable have been interrupted. The company says it is collaborating with Finnish authorities to investigate the incident.
In a press conference, the company stated that the incident occurred in Swedish waters, outside the areas of greatest maritime traffic. “The cable may have been cut by a third party,” said Cinia CEO Ari-Jussi Knaapila. “Last night’s sudden ruling points to this. However, the physical inspection is still pending.”
A Cinia spokesperson told Finnish media that, at the moment, there is no way to determine the cause of the failure. However, he indicated that this type of cable breakage does not occur in these waters without external influence and believes that it could have been severed by an anchor or a bottom trawl.
It is not yet clear how long it will take to fix this second problem. According to Cinia, submarine cable repairs usually last between 5 and 15 days. First the cable must be hoisted from the sea to a repair ship, which will arrive in the area from Calais (France).
In the case of the cable between Lithuania and Sweden, a spokesperson for Telia, the Swedish company that operates it, has confirmed that the Arelion communications cable between the Swedish island of Gotland and Lithuania had suffered physical damage, but that its Lithuanian customers they had not experienced any major disruption as a result. However, it is expected that the maritime fiber optic connection will be restored in the near future. In Sweden, Civil Defense Minister Carl-Oskar Bohlin told SVT radio that Swedish authorities were investigating the two incidents.
