Baltic Sea states plan network to counter hybrid threats

Baltic Sea region countries have agreed to exchange information more quickly and coordinate their response to hybrid threats, Interior Minister Martynas Katelynas told LRT, citing BNS.

During a visit to Flensburg, Germany, Katelynas said he and colleagues from the region had agreed to begin creating an operational communications and action-coordination channel involving state secretaries and deputy ministers.

The channel is intended to facilitate rapid information-sharing about planned or completed acts of sabotage and other hybrid attacks, as well as coordinate preventive measures and possible responses.

“We see similar acts of sabotage and similar methods being used in different European countries. We therefore cannot treat these incidents as isolated and unrelated events. We must share information, compare data and see the bigger picture,” Katelynas said.

He said an increasing amount of information indicated that Russian special services were prepared to use sabotage and other forms of hybrid influence against European countries. The response, he said, needed to be strong and coordinated.

“If a new method is identified in one country, the others must learn about it immediately. Information must move faster than the threat,” Katelynas said.

His comments followed an announcement by Latvia’s Interior Ministry that countries in the Baltic Sea region had agreed to establish a new rapid-response group to counter growing hybrid threats.

Katelynas said Europe needed to move from responding to isolated incidents to a common assessment of the situation and be prepared not only to respond to hybrid attacks but also to prevent them.

Europe has seen a rise in incidents that Western countries regard as hybrid attacks directed against them. Intelligence services have also warned that Russia is considering attacks on critical infrastructure in NATO’s eastern-flank countries using Ukrainian drones.