NATO’s senior expert on cyber and hybrid threats says the persistent attacks on undersea cables across Europe is “the most active threat” to Western infrastructure. 

Acting Assistant Secretary General for Innovation Hybrid and Cyber, James Appathurai says recent attacks on the communications cables attributed by the alliance to Russia is part of a significant growth in cyber, hybrid and other interference in Europe. 

Early in November two cables were severed in the Baltic Sea between Sweden and Lithuania and another between Germany and Finland immediately alarming member states and NATO concerned about sabotage. 

‘The Russians are carrying out a program they have had for decades. It’s called the Russian Undersea Research Program, which is a euphemism for a paramilitary structure, very well-funded, that is mapping out all of our cables and our energy pipelines”, says Appathurai.

‘It has so-called research ships. They have little submarines underneath. They have unmanned, uncrewed, remotely operated vehicles they have divers and explosives’, he tells Euronews’ Europe Conversation. 

In Germany, Finland, the governments were quick to lay blame at potential saboteurs for the apparent attacks on the cables. 

“No one believes that the cables were accidentally damaged. I also don’t want to believe that the ships’ anchors caused the damage by accident,” said German Defense Minister Boris Pistorious.  

Finnish Defense Minister Antti Häkkänen said Nato needed to do a lot more to defend Western critical infrastructure. 

Sweden said an investigation into the cables is now underway. 

“Russia is systematically attacking European security architecture”, said a joint statement from foreign ministers of Germany, France, Poland, Italy, Spain and the U.K. 

“Moscow’s escalating hybrid activities against NATO and E.U. countries are also unprecedented in their variety and scale, creating significant security risks”, it read. 

Ninety per cent of the world’s digital communications data passes through the undersea cables. And around €10 trillion in financial transactions pass through daily. In addition to cables, critical undersea infrastructure also includes electricity connectors and pipelines supplying oil and gas.  

Appathurai says cyber-attacks, disinformation, political interference are also on the increase.  

‘They’re the baseline. And all of it higher than it used to be. What’s new is an increased Russian appetite and for a campaign of sabotage’, he says.  

‘That means arson, derailing trains, attacks on politicians’ properties, attempts to assassinate, for example, the head of Rheinmetal’, the largest German arms manufacturer which supplies Ukraine with important 155mm artillery shells. 

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US intelligence foiled the assassination plot last July which was likely a part of greater plan to target defence industry leaders supplying Ukraine.

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BEIRUT –

At least two people were wounded by Israeli fire in southern Lebanon on Thursday, according to state media. The Israeli military said it had fired at people trying to return to certain areas on the second day of a ceasefire with the Hezbollah militant group.

The agreement, brokered by the United States and France, includes an initial two-month ceasefire in which Hezbollah militants are to withdraw north of the Litani River and Israeli forces are to return to their side of the border. The buffer zone would be patrolled by Lebanese troops and UN peacekeepers.

Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency said two people were wounded by Israeli fire in Markaba, close to the border, without providing further details. It said Israel fired artillery in three other locations near the border. There were no immediate reports of casualties.

An Associated Press reporter in northern Israel near the border heard Israeli drones buzzing overhead and the sound of artillery strikes from the Lebanese side.

The Israeli military said in a statement that “several suspects were identified arriving with vehicles to a number of areas in southern Lebanon, breaching the conditions of the ceasefire.” It said troops “opened fire toward them” and would “actively enforce violations of the ceasefire agreement.”

Israeli officials have said forces will be withdrawn gradually as it ensures that the agreement is being enforced. Israel has warned people not to return to areas where troops are deployed, and says it reserves the right to strike Hezbollah if it violates the terms of the truce.

A Lebanese military official said Lebanese troops would gradually deploy in the south as Israeli troops withdraw. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief media.

The ceasefire agreement announced late Tuesday ended 14 months of conflict between Israel and Hezbollah that began a day after Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023 attack out of Gaza, when the Lebanese militant group began firing rockets, drones and missiles in solidarity.

Israel retaliated with airstrikes, and the conflict steadily intensified for nearly a year before boiling over into all-out war in mid-September. The war in Gaza is still raging with no end in sight.

More than 3,760 people were killed by Israeli fire in Lebanon during the conflict, many of them civilians, according to Lebanese health officials. The fighting killed more than 70 people in Israel — over half of them civilians — as well as dozens of Israeli soldiers fighting in southern Lebanon.

Some 1.2 million people were displaced in Lebanon, and thousands began streaming back to their homes on Wednesday despite warnings from the Lebanese military and the Israeli army to stay out of certain areas. Some 50,000 people were displaced on the Israeli side, but few have returned and the communities near the northern border are still largely deserted.

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Frankel reported from northern Israel. Associated Press writer Natalie Melzer in Nahariya, Israel contributed.

Following an overnight missile and drone attack by Russia targeting Ukraine’s key energy infrastructure, Russian President Vladimir Putin now says that government buildings in Kyiv could be targeted next using a new hypersonic missile that could also potentially reach the U.S.

Russian attacks have not so far struck “decision-making centers” in the Ukrainian capital as Kyiv is heavily protected by air defenses. But Putin says Russia’s Oreshnik hypersonic missile, which it fired for the first time at a Ukrainian city last week, is incapable of being intercepted.

Russia fired the Oreshnik at the Ukrainian city of Dnipro on Nov. 21, striking a weapons production plant. This was in retaliation against Ukrainian strikes on a Russian military facility in Bryansk two days earlier with U.S. made long-range missiles called ATACMS, after President Biden had given Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy permission to do so.

RUSSIA LAUNCHES ANOTHER LARGE MISSILE, DRONE ATTACK ON UKRAINE’S ENERGY INFRASTRUCTURE

Russia says Ukraine fired more ATACMS at its Kursk region on Nov. 23 and Nov. 25.

“Of course, we will respond to the ongoing strikes on Russian territory with long-range Western-made missiles, as has already been said, including by possibly continuing to test the Oreshnik in combat conditions, as was done on November 21,” Putin told a meeting of a security alliance of ex-Soviet countries in Kazakhstan.

“At present, the Ministry of Defense and the General Staff are selecting targets to hit on Ukrainian territory. These could be military facilities, defense and industrial enterprises, or decision-making centers in Kyiv,” he said.

The instrumentations of the Oreshnik missile – its sensors, electronics, data acquisition capabilities – are those of the Rubezh, a Russian solid-fueled intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM). With its flight capability of between 310 miles and 3,100 miles – just 310 miles below the standard low limit of an ICBM – the Oreshnik can target most of Europe and the West Coast of the United States. After a launch, such a missile could probably hit Britain in 20 minutes and Poland in 12 minutes.

The Oreshnik can be outfitted with a non-nuclear or nuclear warhead. And it is nearly impossible to intercept by existing missile defense systems because it is designed to fly at hypersonic speeds, reaching Mach 11.

Putin said Russia’s production of advanced missile systems exceeds that of the NATO military alliance by 10 times, and that Moscow planned to ramp up production further.

His plans to increase production and ongoing strikes mean the conflict – which has already passed 1,000 days – shows no signs of abating. 

Russia unleashed a massive aerial drone and missile attack on Ukraine on Thursday targeting the country’s key energy infrastructure, leaving more than a million households without power in the west, south and center of the country, Ukrainian officials said.

RUSSIA LAUNCHES RECORD NUMBER OF DRONES IN NEW ATTACK

Firefighters put out a fire caused by a Russian drone and missile attack. (Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy via X)

The attack consisted of firing nearly 200 missiles and drones with explosions being reported in Kyiv, Kharkiv, Rivne, Khmelnytskyi, Lutsk and many other cities in central and western Ukraine.

The operation was Russia’s second major aerial attack on Ukraine’s power grid in less than two weeks, with President Vladimir Putin saying on Thursday that the attack was a response to Kyiv’s attacks on Russian regions using longer-range American missiles.

The attack has raised fears in Ukraine that Russia is looking to cripple its energy infrastructure before the winter cold starts to bite and dampen Ukrainian spirits about the outcome of the war.

Zelenskyy said that the attack was a “vile escalation” and that Kalibr cruise missiles with cluster munitions were used to deliberately target civilian infrastructure.

“The use of these cluster elements significantly complicates the work of our rescuers and power engineers in mitigating the damage, marking yet another vile escalation in Russia’s terrorist tactics,” Zelenskyy wrote on X.

He urged Western countries to deliver on promised air defense weaponry. Ukrainian officials in the past have grumbled that military aid is slow to arrive.

The Thursday attack came just hours after President-elect Trump nominated Lt. Gen. Keith Kellogg for a potential new post focused on ending the Russia-Ukraine war. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

The attack came just hours after President-elect Trump nominated Lt. Gen. Keith Kellogg for a potential new post focused on ending the Russia-Ukraine war. Trump has created the position of special envoy for the Ukraine conflict,

Three sources familiar told Reuters that Kellogg presented Trump with a plan to end the conflict, and in April co-authored a research document that presented the idea of using weapons supplied to Ukraine as leverage for armistice negotiations with Russia.

Rebekah Koffler, The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.