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Norwegian police said on Friday (January 31, 2025) they had arrested a Norwegian ship with an all-Russian crew on suspicion of involvement in causing damage to a fibre optic cable in the Baltic Sea.

“The arrest took place at the request of Latvian authorities,” the police in the northern Norwegian city of Tromsoe said. “It is suspected that the ship has been involved in serious damage to a fibre cable in the Baltic Sea between Latvia and Sweden,” the police said in a statement.

“The Norwegian-owned and flagged vessel, named as Silver Dania, had been sailing from St. Petersburg in the Baltic Sea to Murmansk in the Russian Arctic,” police said.

Oslo:

Norway has raised its terrorism threat assessment to the second-highest level due to an increased risk of attacks against Jewish and Israeli targets, the national police directorate said on Tuesday.

Last week police in neighbouring Denmark charged two men suspected of detonating hand grenades near Israel’s Copenhagen embassy, while police in Sweden are investigating a suspected shooting near the Israeli diplomatic mission in Stockholm.

Norwegian police officers, who are normally unarmed, will now carry guns nationwide as a result of the decision by the PST security service to raise the threat level, the directorate said.

“PST raises the terror threat level in Norway from moderate to high as a result of the ongoing escalation of the conflict in the Middle East,” the police said in a statement.

“It is primarily the threat to Jewish and Israeli targets that has been further intensified,” the statement said.

The PST risk assessment was raised from level three (moderate) to level four (high), on PST’s five-point scale where the top end of the range would indicate imminent danger.

National Police Commissioner Benedicte Bjoernland said there was an increased likelihood of attempted terrorism.

“…we have a number of measures in place to protect the population,” she said in a statement.

Sweden in August last year raised its terrorist alert to the second-highest level after Koran burnings outraged Muslims and triggered threats from jihadists.

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