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Sweden has announced that it has sent a formal request to China for cooperation over the suspected sabotage of two undersea cables in the Baltic Sea.
The prime minister, Ulf Kristersson, said on Thursday that Swedish authorities were seeking “clarity” from China about what happened to the two fibre-optic cables between Finland and Germany and Sweden and Lithuania last week.
“Today I can tell you that we have additionally sent a formal request to work together with Swedish authorities to get clarity about what has happened,” he said in a press conference.
“We expect China will choose to work together as we have requested.”
It comes amid speculation about the Chinese ship Yi Peng 3, which sailed over the cables at about the time they were severed and has remained anchored since 19 November in the Kattegat strait between Sweden and Denmark, where it is being monitored by multiple vessels, including the Danish navy.
Sweden, which is leading the investigation, has declined to comment on the claims and China’s foreign ministry has denied any responsibility.
The Wall Street Journal reported that investigators suspect the crew of the Chinese vessel deliberately severed the cables last week by dragging an anchor along the seabed for more than 100 miles.
The Swedish police and prosecutor declined to comment on the claim, saying they had nothing to add to Wednesday’s statements when they announced that the crime scene investigations of the two cables had been completed and that analysis was continuing.
The Swedish navy and coastguard also declined to comment.
The absence of any seismic signals to indicate explosions, as there were with the Nord Stream and Balticconnector pipelines, could support the theory that the damage was caused by an anchor, Norsar, the Norwegian national datacentre for the comprehensive nuclear test ban treaty, said. Kjølv Egeland, a senior researcher at Norsar, said: “There was no explosion or seismic signal at all, so that could be consistent with this anchor theory.”
The Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines, which carried natural gas from Russia to Germany under the Baltic Sea, were damaged in explosions in September 2022. In August this year it was claimed that the explosions were the work of a small Ukrainian sabotage team but this was denied by the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
In a subsequent incident in the Baltic, in October 2023, the Balticconnector gas pipeline was extensively damaged. Finnish investigators recovered a large ship’s anchor near the spot which was linked to a Chinese container vessel, NewNew Polar Bear.
The Swedish prosecutor said: “The cable between Sweden and Lithuania, which is owned by a Swedish company, was damaged on 17 November. The cable between Finland and Germany, located south of the Sweden-Lithuania cable, was damaged a number of hours later. Both damage sites are located within the Swedish economic zone.”
Finnish police said investigators at the crime scene investigation into the cable rupture site between Finland and Germany had collected cable samples for further analysis. They said the damage was being investigated as aggravated criminal damage and aggravated interference with communications.
Kristersson said on Wednesday that the Baltic Sea was now a “high-risk” zone as he met Nordic and Baltic leaders at a summit in Harpsund, Sweden.
“We are aware that there is a high risk for different types of activities on the Baltic Sea that are dangerous,” he said.
He added: “Now we are careful about not accusing anybody right now of anything. We don’t know that this is sabotage. But we are investigating the matter very carefully.”
