Poland: “Moscow plans terrorist acts against aircraft worldwide”, Finland stops Russian sabotage action in the nick of time

“Without going into detail, I can confirm that there are well-founded fears that Russia has planned acts of terror in the air, not only against Poland, but also against airlines around the world.”

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said this on Wednesday at a press conference with the president of neighboring Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky. He had come to Poland for a series of discussions. According to Tusk, joint action is required. (Read more below the photo)

Poland, a member of the EU and NATO, has been one of Ukraine’s most important allies since Russia launched a war against Kiev in February 2022. Tusk vowed to do everything possible to break the deadlock in Ukraine’s European accession process. “The Polish presidency of the EU will break the impasse that has developed in recent months. And we will work with Ukraine and our European partners, without preconditions, to accelerate the process as much as possible.”

For his part, Zelensky emphasized that “the sooner Ukraine joins the EU, the sooner Ukraine joins NATO, the more we will act together, the sooner all of Europe will get the geopolitical security it needs.”

Catastrophe

There have been several recent incidents in which submarine cables in the Baltic Sea were allegedly deliberately damaged. For example, fiber optic cables between Helsinki and the German city of Rostock were damaged in two cases. Finland now claims to have stopped a Russian oil tanker before the vessel could cause any more damage.

The oil tanker Eagle S, which flew the flag of the Cook Islands, is linked to the damage to the submarine cables. The anchor of the oil tanker was found at the bottom of the Baltic Sea. According to the EU, the ship is part of the Russian shadow fleet. Investigators believe that the vessel would also have damaged other cables if timely action had not been taken. “Another 12 minutes and damage would have been catastrophic,” Finnish President Alexander Stubb said on Tuesday during a summit in Helsinki of NATO countries around the Baltic Sea.

NATO will “fight back” against undermining attacks, NATO CEO Mark Rutte said on Tuesday after the summit meeting with the leaders of Germany, Poland, Denmark, Finland, Sweden, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Patrols on the vast waters are being expanded, NATO announced. Following the Finnish example, NATO countries will also take more decisive action against the often obscure ships that Russia uses to evade Western sanctions and which lately appear to be targeting submarine infrastructure. NATO countries around the Baltic Sea will monitor suspicious ships more quickly and, if necessary, arrest them.