Finland holds Baltic Sea cable security drill

Finland completed an EU maritime security exercise in the Baltic Sea on Thursday, with border guards practising how to take control of a suspicious ship after suspected damage to undersea infrastructure.

About 300 Finnish and Polish security officials took part on the final day of the MARSEC EU exercise, which was held in the Baltic Sea for the first time.

Commander Ilja Iljin of the Finnish Border Guard said the exercise involved "improving cable security in the Baltic Sea Basin." Speaking on a Finnish icebreaker used as the target vessel, he said authorities had to be ready for another incident "tonight or in a couple of months."

The exercise followed several incidents involving ships suspected of deliberately damaging underwater infrastructure in the Gulf of Finland.

Finnish authorities stopped the Fitburg cargo ship on December 31, 2025, while it was travelling from Russia to Israel, on suspicion that it had dragged its anchor and damaged two telecoms cables linking Finland and Estonia.

In early September, the ship's Russian captain and a senior crew member went on trial in Finland on charges of aggravated criminal mischief and aggravated interference with telecommunications.

Experts and politicians have claimed suspected sabotage of undersea infrastructure is part of Russia's "hybrid war" against Western countries. The supplied material did not state that any court has established responsibility for the cable incidents.