The expert commented on the incident with cable breakage in the Baltic Sea

Alleged sabotage in the Baltic Sea may serve as another pretext for deploying more NATO forces in the region, Tigran Meloyan, an analyst at the Center for Mediterranean Studies at the National Research University Higher School of Economics, told Izvestia.

"The incoming news that two communication cables were damaged at the bottom of the Baltic Sea as a result of an alleged sabotage will obviously serve as another pretext for building up the alliance's forces in one of the hotspots of contact between Russia and NATO in the Baltic-Black Sea arc. It is the Baltic region that is seen as the theater with the highest level of tension after Ukraine in relations with Russia," the expert said.

He also emphasized that the countries that have critical maritime infrastructure in this region and have direct access to the Baltic Sea area are more interested in limiting the movement of the Russian fleet in the Baltic Sea.

"But the West will not dare to go for the direct use of warships to block the Russian fleet, as this would automatically mean casus belli, but will continue to look for the most sophisticated methods to cause Russia maximum inconvenience. Among such methods are the ongoing sanctions pressure and hunting for the so-called Russian shadow fleet, as well as the legal elaboration of the issue of Estonia and Finland expanding their territorial waters in order to turn the Gulf of Finland into an even narrower throat," Tigran Meloyan added.

Two undersea fiber optic cables were damaged in the Baltic Sea. One between Lithuania and Sweden, the other between Finland and Germany. German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius said the severing of the second one was most likely the result of sabotage.

Read more in the exclusive material of Izvestia:

Cable weapons: the West is looking for reasons to confront Russia on the Baltic Sea