Pistorius called sabotage the main cause of the Baltic Sea cable rupture

Damage to the C-Lion1 telecommunications cable, which runs along the bottom of the Baltic Sea, in all likelihood could have been caused by sabotage. This was stated by German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius on November 19.

The head of the German Ministry noted that the rupture of the cable is a very clear signal of what is actually happening in the specified water area.

"No one believes that this cable was accidentally broken. I am not inclined to trust the version that the damage occurred because the cable allegedly hit an anchor. <...> We have to proceed on the assumption that we are talking about sabotage," Reuters quoted Pistorius as saying to reporters in Brussels.

He also added that the German Defense Ministry had no information about who exactly could have carried out this act of sabotage, but believed it was a hybrid action.

Thebreakage of the communication cable between Lithuania and Sweden, laid on the bottom of the Baltic Sea, became known on November 18. According to preliminary data, the wire was cut, an investigation is underway. Andrius Šemeškevičius, Director of Technology of the telecommunications company Telia Lietuva, pointed out that the damaged cable is quite old and there have already been several accidents with it. He noted that no cases of sabotage at the site had been recorded before.

At the same time, Swedish Civil Defense Minister Karl-Oskar Bolin said that the incidents with severed communication cables between Lithuania and Sweden, as well as Finland and Germany in the Baltic Sea were being investigated by the Swedish authorities. He said that against the backdrop of a serious security situation, the government was keeping the issue under control and following the developments very closely.

On the same day, the C-Lion1 telecommunication cable laid on the bottom of the Baltic Sea between Finland and Germany was severed. Its length is almost 1.2 thousand kilometers and its depth is about a meter. The cable runs next to the gas pipeline. Cinia, a fiber optic network construction company, informed the media that the cable had been cut. It was specified that the repair has started and will take up to 15 days. The German and Finnish foreign ministries said in a joint statement that an investigation into the incident was underway.

Prior to that, on November 11, Nikolai Patrushev, Russian presidential aide and chairman of the Russian Maritime Board, said that after Finland and Sweden joined NATO, and against the background of the undermining of the Nord Stream and Nord Stream-2 pipelines, the most important military and political task of the Russian Federation is the protection of the Baltic Sea, and new measures are being taken in this area. According to him, the US and its allies in Europe are seeking to militarize the Baltic Sea. He stated that this is a traditional strategy for the West.