Ten European countries have agreed to step up the protection of critical underwater infrastructure in the Baltic Sea amid fears that Russia uses its shadow fleet as a weapon against EU and NATO countries.
On Friday, the foreign ministers of Lithuania, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Iceland, Latvia, Poland, Norway, Sweden and Germany signed a memorandum in Tallinn. It provides for enhanced cooperation to improve the resilience of cables and pipelines on the seabed, to ensure the security of supply chains, to carry out underwater monitoring, and to expand rapid repair capabilities.
The document also includes provisions on information protection, possible joint sources of funding and coordination of actions.
“The document marks a strong political will to work together to ensure energy, economic and digital security throughout the region,” the Lithuanian Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Friday.
In Tallinn, the ministers also discussed the latest incident that took place a few days ago in Estonia’s exclusive economic zone when the sanctioned shadow tanker Jaguar refused to comply with Estonia's legitimate demands and the Russian military plane guarding it violated Estonia’s airspace.
“Russia is using its shadow fleet as a weapon against us. This was clearly demonstrated by the incident involving the sanctioned tanker Jaguar when Russia used its air force to defend it,” Lithuania’s Foreign Minister Kęstutis Budrys said.
He said it was vital to continue the strict sanctions against shadow fleet vessels as individual vessels are currently sanctioned differently by the US, the UK and the European Union.
Under Lithuania’s proposal, 200 additional Russian ships that are part of the shadow fleet have been sanctioned in the EU’s latest 17th sanction package.
Another important step, Budrys said, is the increase of NATO’s military presence in the Baltic Sea, the extension of the mandate of NATO’s Baltic Sentry mission and the revision of national response rules, with the involvement of naval forces even in peacetime.
A number of breaches of underwater infrastructure have been recorded in the Baltic Sea in recent years. In response to these incidents, NATO launched its new Baltic Sentry surveillance mission in the Baltic Sea in January to prevent attempts to attack underwater infrastructure in the region.
