Latvia needs to act in a clever way to protect its critical infrastructure and prevent Russia from organising provocations with potentially severe consequences, LTV programme Rīta panorāma was told by Minister of the Interior Rihards Kozlovskis.
As for Latvia’s capabilities in defending its underwater infrastructure in the Baltic Sea, the minister said that, considering the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, he is sceptical about the perspectives of changing anything on the level of international legislation. Nevertheless, he said such a possibility is not entirely unlikely in the future.
“We need to sit down and think primarily about the initial defence, which we can do today […], but in the exclusive waters of the economic zone to act with armed force against another country’s ship – at the moment it is regulated as unauthorized,” said Kozlovskis.
He also stressed that if Latvia’s potential actions in trying to protect its infrastructure could be interpreted as a violation of international maritime law, then it could even be beneficial for Russia. Consequently, we must strengthen our defences wisely in order to prevent any provocations that could lead to dire consequences, said the minister.
As for the damage caused to the cable owned by Latvian State Radio and Television Centre, Kozlovskis said he is sceptical about the initial report from Swedish prosecutors – that it wasn’t sabotage. He said it is suspicious that lately there have been many seemingly accidental navigation system disruptions and unfortunate circumstances under which the infrastructure of countries not friendly towards Russia was damaged.
As for last week’s disconnection of Baltic States from Russia’s BRELL grid and the connection to Europe’s unified energy grid, Kozlovskis said the interior affairs sector will continue operating on high alert until Friday, the 14th of February. He said all measures will be decided soon.
According to the minister, before the disconnection of the Baltic States from BRELL, Russian and Belarusian propaganda channels were sending such a wide wave of disinformation in our direction about the possible power supply crisis that any real acts of sabotage cannot be ruled out in order to try to bring the aforementioned threat to life.