Finland charges Eagle S tanker captain, officers over cable cuts

By Essi Lehto

HELSINKI, Aug 11 (Reuters) - Finland's national prosecutor's office said on Monday it had brought charges against the captain and first and second officers of the Eagle S oil tanker over the cutting of undersea cables in the Gulf of Finland in December.

The Georgian and Indian nationals are suspected of aggravated criminal mischief and aggravated interference with communications by dragging the ship's anchor for around 90 km (56 miles) across the seabed, a prosecutors' statement said.

The defendants, who are not permitted to leave Finland, have denied committing the offences and consider that Finland also lacks jurisdiction in the case as the incident took place outside Finnish territorial waters, it said.

Finnish authorities have said the Cook Islands-registered Eagle S broke the Estlink 2 undersea power cable connecting Finland and Estonia as well as four internet lines.

"The owners of the cables have suffered a total of at least 60 million euros ($70 million) in immediate damage in the form of repair costs alone," the prosecutors' office said.

The Baltic Sea region has been on high alert for sabotage after a string of outages of power cables, gas pipelines and telecoms, although subsea infrastructure is also subject to technical malfunctions and outages caused by accidents.

The Eagle S disruption caused serious risks to energy supply and telecommunications in Finland, although services were secured via alternative connections, the prosecutors' statement said.

A lawyer for United Arab Emirates-based Caravella LLC FZ, the owner of the Eagle S, has previously said Helsinki lacked jurisdiction to intervene in the case.

The lawyer for the company did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Monday.

The prosecutors' office said a local court would set a date for hearing the case and, if necessary, determine whether it falls under Finnish jurisdiction.

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