Sweden seizes tanker suspected of being behind latest Baltic cable outage

The Swedish Prosecution Authority has seized a ship suspected of damaging un underwater fiber optic cable linking Latvia and the Swedish island of Gotland yesterday, the latest in a series of undersea sabotage attacks plaguing the Baltic region.

The ship in question this time is the 32,200 dwt, Maltese-flagged oil tanker Vezhen, which was sailing from Russia. The vessel is owned by Navibulgar from Bulgaria. 

Seabed gas pipelines, power cables and fiber optic cables have all been attacked – likely by merchant ships dragging their anchors – in recent months across the Baltic, forcing NATO to establish Baltic Sentry, a naval protection operation.

A joint statement from the heads of state or government of Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Sweden earlier this month noted: “Combatting breakage of undersea cables and pipelines represents a global problem.”

The statement went on to discuss the threats posed by the growth of the shadow fleet. 

“Russia’s use of the so-called shadow fleet poses a particular threat to the maritime and environmental security in the Baltic Sea region and globally. This reprehensible practice also threatens the integrity of undersea infrastructure, increases risks connected to sea-dumped chemical munitions, and significantly supports funding of Russia’s illegal war of aggression against Ukraine,” the statement read.