The Swedish government has announced that an undersea telecommunications cable connecting Estonia and Sweden has suffered damage, as revealed by Civil Defense Minister Carl-Oskar Bohlin.

Although the cable is impaired, it has not been completely destroyed. The damage to the cable appears to have occurred concurrently with the recent incident involving a gas pipeline connecting Finland and Estonia, which sustained damage earlier this month.

According to sources cited by the BBC, Finland suspects Russian involvement in this sabotage, viewing it as a form of "retribution" following the country's recent NATO membership. However, Russian President Vladimir Putin has vehemently denied these allegations, dismissing them as baseless. Last week, Finland expressed its belief that the pipeline had been intentionally sabotaged.

During a press conference held on Tuesday, Mr. Bohlin emphasized that the precise cause of the damage remains unknown. Swedish investigators will collaborate with their Finnish and Estonian counterparts in the investigation.

The damage to the natural gas pipeline between Estonia and Finland was discovered on October 8th, with Finnish authorities reporting that both the pipeline and a telecommunications cable sustained damage at two different locations.

Finnish investigators separately identified two ships they said were operating on the day of the incident in the area where the damage was discovered. One ship was Russian-flagged and the other was Chinese-owned, they said.

Mr Bohlin said the damage happened "at a similar time and in physical proximity" to the previously reported incident. Swedish network Arelion confirmed that one of its fiber optic cables had been damaged.

Countries on the Baltic Sea have been in a state of heightened vigilance regarding potential sabotage of undersea infrastructure since last September when the Nord Stream 2 undersea pipeline was rendered inoperable by a series of explosions.

It remains unclear which state or actor was responsible for the attack on Nord Stream 2, which was built to transport natural gas from Russia to Germany - though it was never put into service.

Ukraine has denied reports that a pro-Ukrainian group was responsible for the blasts. Russia has also denied any involvement.

At a meeting of the British-led Joint Expeditionary Force last week, Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson warned that undersea data cables were liable to sabotage.

"There is a spaghetti of cables on the seabed," Mr. Kristersson said on Friday, adding that the infrastructure was both essential to the modern economy and vulnerable to attack.

Sweden applied to join NATO in 2022, at the same time as Finland. But while Finland's accession was approved in April, Sweden's bid has been held up by opposition from Hungary and Turkey and the country remains outside the alliance.

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