Helsinki, Finland — Finnish investigators probing damage to a Baltic Sea power cable and several data cables said they found an anchor drag mark on the seabed, apparently from a Russian-linked ship that has already been seized for investigation.
The Estlink-2 power cable, which carries energy from Finland to Estonia across the Baltic Sea, failed on December 25 after an obvious rupture. This had little impact on services but followed earlier damage to two data cables and the Nord Stream gas pipelinesboth of which were characterized as sabotage.
Finnish police chief investigator Sami Paila said Sunday evening that the trail stretched “tens of kilometers… or almost a hundred kilometers (62 miles).”
Jussi Nukari/Lehtikuva/Reuters
“Our current understanding is that the drag mark in question is that of the anchor of the ship Eagle S. We were able to clarify this issue through underwater research,” Paila told Finnish national broadcaster Yle.
“I can say that we have a first understanding of what happened at sea and how the anchor mark was created there,” Paila said, without providing further details. He also stressed that “the question of intention is a very essential question which must be clarified during the preliminary investigation and which will be clarified as the investigation progresses.”
On Saturday, the ship was escorted to an inland anchorage near the port of Porvoo, to aid the investigation, officials said. He is the subject of a criminal investigation for aggravated telecommunications damage, aggravated vandalism and aggravated regulatory offense.
The ship is flagged in the Cook Islands but has been described by Finnish customs officials and the European Union’s executive commission as part of Russia’s ghost fleet of tankers. These are aging ships, with obscure owners, acquired to escape Western sanctions against Russia in the context of the war in Ukraine and operating without insurance regulated by the West.
Russia’s use of these vessels has sparked environmental concerns about accidents, given their age and uncertain insurance coverage.
Following the cable break, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte said last week that the military alliance, which Finland joined last year, would step up patrols in the region of the Baltic Sea, where tensions have increased since the launch of the full-scale Russian invasion. of Ukraine in February 2022.
Finland, which shares an 832-mile border with Russia, abandoned its decades-old policy of neutrality and joined NATO in 2023, amid Russia’s war against Ukraine.
About seven months after the Russian invasion began, a series of underwater explosions ruptured Nord Stream pipelines built to transport Russian gas to Europe. The cause has not yet been confirmed, but Germany has wanted three Ukrainian nationals for questioning in connection with the alleged sabotage.
At the end of November 2024, parts of two data cables were severed in Swedish territorial waters. Ship tracking sites show that the Chinese cargo ship Yi Peng 3 had been sailing on the cables at the time they were cut.
Russia responded with derision to early speculation by European officials that the cables may have been damaged as part of Moscow’s hybrid warfare efforts. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said at the time that it was “completely absurd to continue blaming Russia for everything without any reason.”