EU preparing sanctions on Russia's 'shadow fleet' after Baltic Sea cable damaged

Countries in the region have been on alert following a string of incidents involving undersea cables and gas pipelines in the Baltic Sea since 2022.

Transcript

00:00The EU foreign policy chief has said the bloc is preparing sanctions on what it calls Russia's

00:07shadow fleet after an undersea power cable in the Baltic Sea was damaged.

00:12Kaya Kalas posted the statement from the EU Commission on X saying that the vessels with

00:17obscure ownership threaten security and the environment while funding Russia's war budget.

00:23Kalas also said the EU was strengthening efforts to protect undersea cables, adding that there

00:29was no risk to regional power supplies.

00:32That comes after Finnish authorities detained a Russian ship as part of an investigation

00:37into damage to the Estlink 2 power cable.

00:40It carries electricity from Finland to Estonia across the Baltic Sea and went down on Wednesday.

00:59Countries in the region have been on alert following a string of incidents involving

01:18undersea cables and gas pipelines in the Baltic Sea since 2022.

01:23Two data cables, one running between Finland and Germany and the other between Lithuania

01:28and Sweden, were severed in November.

01:31Last year, a pipeline carrying gas from Estonia to Finland was closed due to an apparent leak,

01:37which officials blamed on external activity.

01:40And the Nord Stream pipelines that once brought natural gas from Russia to Germany were damaged

01:45by underwater explosions in September 2022.