BULK carrier Vezhen has been released by Swedish authorities after being seized in relation to a subsea cable damage incident.
The Swedish Prosecution Authority announced the decision to lift the seizure of the Maltese-flagged ship, declaring the investigation shows it was not a case of gross sabotage.
Vezhen was suspected of having deliberately damaged the Ventspils-Gotland optical cable on 26 January, which runs between Sweden and Latvia in the Baltic Sea.
The prosecution authority instead revealed that a combination of weather conditions and deficiencies in equipment and seamanship contributed to the cable break.
“The investigation has been systematic and thorough in order to clarify the incident,” said senior prosecutor Mats Ljungqvist from Sweden’s National Security Unit.
“After interrogations, seizures that have been made and analyzed, and crime scene investigations that have been carried out, we can say with certainty that this is not a case of sabotage.
“At the same time, we have been able to establish that it is the ship that was seized that caused the cable break.”
Ljungqvist affirmed his unit had very good cooperation with several Swedish authorities during the process.
“I would particularly like to highlight the Coast Guard and the Police Authority as well as the Armed Forces. Without the good cooperation, the investigation would not have been able to reach the investigative stage that we have now reached,” he said.
Authorities did say however that the investigation is continuing to determine whether there are other crimes that can be suspected in connection with the cable break.
The decision by Swedish authorities to release Vezhen comes just days after Norwegian authorities released a ship that was seized over a separate Baltic Sea subsea cable damage incident.
Norwegian-flagged Silver Dania was detained by Norwegian police last week on suspicion of involvement in causing damage to a telecoms cable, but was released yesterday.
Meanwhile, Eagle S remains under investigation by Finnish authorities over the Estlink 2 cable incident in December last year.
