Sweden Opens Sabotage Probe Into Baltic Undersea Cable Damage

By Andrius Sytas and Johan Ahlander

STOCKHOLM/VILNIUS, Jan 26 (Reuters) – An undersea fiber optic cable between Latvia and Sweden was damaged on Sunday, likely as a result of external influence, Latvia said, prompting NATO to deploy patrol ships to the area and triggering a sabotage investigation by Swedish authorities.

Sweden’s Security Service has seized control of a vessel as part of the probe, the country’s prosecution authority said.

“We are now carrying out a number of concrete investigative measures, but I cannot go into what they consist of due to the ongoing preliminary investigation,” senior prosecutor Mats Ljungqvist said in a statement.

NATO was coordinating military ships and aircraft under its recently deployed mission, dubbed “Baltic Sentry.” The effort follows a string of incidents in which power cables, telecom links and gas pipelines have been damaged in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

Latvian Prime Minister Evika Silina said her government was coordinating with NATO and other countries in the Baltic Sea region to clarify the circumstances surrounding the latest incident.

“We have determined that there is most likely ex…