UK Defense Ministry says 3 Russian submarines conducted suspicious activity near undersea cables in North Atlantic
Britain’s Defense Ministry said three Russian submarines were detected conducting malicious activity above critical underwater infrastructure in the northern Atlantic Ocean.
Defense Secretary John Healey told a special press conference broadcast by BBC News on April 9 that British forces and their NATO allies had detected a Russian nuclear-powered Shchuka-B class submarine, known to NATO as an Akula-class vessel, in international waters in the northern Atlantic several weeks earlier. The submarine, it emerged, had been acting as a decoy for two deep-sea vessels operated by the Russian Defense Ministry’s Main Directorate for Deep Sea Research, which were active in the same area.
The ministry stated that the submarines had been engaged in activity above critical underwater infrastructure but did not specify what that activity involved.
British forces made clear to the Russians that they had been detected, after which the submarines left that part of the northern Atlantic, the ministry stated.
Healey addressed Russian President Vladimir Putin directly, warning that British forces could see the submarines and their activity around undersea cables and pipelines, and that any attempt to cause damage would not go unpunished and would carry serious consequences.
Russia had not commented on the U.K. Defense Ministry’s account of the submarine operation at the time of publication.
Britain relies almost entirely on undersea cables for its connections to the outside world, with 99 percent of its internet traffic passing through them.
BBC Russia noted that this is not the first time Britain has accused Russia of operations against its undersea cables. The U.K. Defense Ministry stated that this operation was more prolonged and more covert than previous ones. Healey said Russia had hoped the war in the Middle East would distract British forces from the movements of Russian submarines, a calculation that proved wrong.
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