HELSINKI (Reuters) – Russia’s increasing cooperation with China, Iran, North Korea and its other global allies is a serious, long-term threat to European countries, Finland’s Defence Minister Antti Hakkanen said on Tuesday.
Finland and Estonia are investigating the destruction in October of the Balticconnector gas pipeline and telecom cables on the Baltic seabed and have named a Hong Kong registered container vessel as their main suspect for the damage.
“While these issues are not public, what Russia does at the moment together with China, Iran, North Korea and its other allies, also from the global south, constitutes a very serious prospect in the long term,” Hakkanen said in a speech.
As the NATO military alliance’s newest member, which shares a 1,340-km (830-mile) border with Russia, Finland and its intelligence services are monitoring Russia’s action globally, Hakkanen said.
He called Russia’s new cooperation with its global allies “a weather system of security policy that is unfortunately troublesome”.
(Reporting by Anne Kauranen; editing by Barbara Lewis)
