Recent damage to undersea cables in the Baltic Sea was likely caused by maritime accidents, not by Russian sabotage as many Western officials have alleged, The Washington Post reported on Sunday.
NATO has used recent incidents to justify an increase in its military presence in the Baltic Sea and launched a new mission called “Baltic Sentry” just last week, a move that ratchets up tensions with Russia. The Guardian reported on Sunday that a NATO naval flotilla has assembled off the coast of Estonia to “protect” undersea infrastructure.
The Post report, which cited US and European intelligence officials, said that “investigations involving the United States and a half-dozen European security services have turned up no indication that commercial ships suspected of dragging anchors across seabed systems did so intentionally or at the direction of Moscow.”
US officials said “clear explanations” in each case indicated the incidents were likely accidents, and no evidence suggested that Russia was involved. In some cases, ships dragging their anchors damaged cables underwater.
The Eagle S, a tanker suspected of damaging a power cable connecting Finland and Estonia, was recently boarded by the Finnish Coast Guard, and its crew has been detained indefinitely while the ship is being investigated.
Finnish officials have accused the Eagle S of being part of a “ghost fleet” that carries Russian oil and avoids Western sanctions. A lawyer representing the ship’s owner acknowledged that it was carrying Russian oil but said it was not a violation of international law and denied the tanker purposely damaged the undersea cable.
Western officials have said the incidents in the Baltic were part of a broader Russian sabotage campaign in Europe, and some officials quoted in the Post report said they were not convinced the damage was caused by accident, but they have produced no evidence for their claims.
