Russia is disrupting mobile communications and ship tracking in the Baltic Sea, which could pose a threat to vessels and energy supplies.

In this way, Russia is trying to test the reaction of Western countries, Polish Vice Admiral Krzysztof Jaworski told Reuters news agency.

According to Jaworski, Russia systematically uses such tactics to hide the movement of its ships and disrupt the operations of other nations in the Baltic Sea.

“The hybrid war in the Baltic is the biggest challenge we face… We are talking about Russia’s aggressive behavior. They are trying to disrupt our lives… They are also testing us, us as an Alliance, to see how far they can go,” the Vice Admiral stated.

According to the head of the German Foreign Intelligence Service, Bruno Kahl, Russian sabotage against Western targets may force NATO to consider invoking Article 5 on mutual defense of the Alliance.

Cable sabotage

On November 18, the technical director of the Lithuanian telecommunications company Telia, Andrius Šemeškevičius, reported that a submarine cable between Lithuania and Sweden was damaged in the Baltic Sea.

Telia transmits the Internet connection to Lithuania via three cables. The incident caused a one-third reduction in Internet bandwidth, but the connection was restored to users, Šemeškevičius shared.

Finnish state-owned data service provider Cinia reported that a “malfunction” was detected in the C-Lion1 cable.

It runs for almost 1200 kilometers from the Finnish capital Helsinki to the German port city of Rostock.

On November 19, the Finnish newspaper Helsingin Sanomat reported that the Chinese ship Yi Peng 3 was passing near two damaged communication cables in the Baltic Sea around the time the damage was discovered.

CNN reported that these incidents occurred several weeks after the United States warned of increased Russian military activity around key undersea cables.

Helsingin Sanomat found out that the Chinese ship, which is believed to be involved in damaging underwater communication cables in the Baltic Sea, was approached by several warships from other countries.