Chinese ship damages telecommunications cable off Taiwan
6 January, 2025 The Shunxin-39 ship, which was involved in cutting a telecommunications cable near Taiwan. Photo: Taiwan Coast Guard A Chinese ship damaged a telecommunications cable off the coast of Taiwan.
The Taiwanese Coast Guard reported on this. The incident occurred at approximately 7:00 am on January 3, 2025, when the Chinese cargo ship Shunxin 39, flying the flag of Cameroon, was passing within the port of Jilong. Later that day, at about 4:40 p.m., the Taiwanese Coast Guard received a report of damage to four cores of Chunghwa Telecom's communication cable and sent a patrol boat from the 1st Fleet of the Coast Guard.
The Chinese vessel was detected at sea 13 kilometers north of Yehliu. The patrol boat PP-10069 took it under escort and ordered it to return to the port of Jilong, but this order was not carried out due to bad weather conditions.
The vessel continued to move into international waters towards South Korea. It should be noted that the first news about the damaged cable began to arrive at 7:51 am on January 3, 2025. Chunghwa Telecom's submarine cable monitoring system detected that an international submarine cable located outside the Jilong Port had had an abnormal interference alarm condition.
The patrol boat PP-10059 of the Taiwanese Coast Guard.
Photo credits: Taiwan Coast Guard
So far, the transmission of the necessary information through the cable has been connected to the backup power supply, which has not caused any serious problems. The maritime administration stated that the information regarding that vessel wouldl be transferred to the Center for Port and Shipping Operations for close monitoring. In the future, when a vessel applies to enter the port, the port authority will dispatch port inspectors, notify the coast guard, and pass the information on to the Chunghwa Telecom for appropriate action.
Militarnyi previously reported that a Chinese vessel suspected of damaging telecommunications cables in the Baltic Sea had acted under instructions from Russian intelligence, according to The Wall Street Journal. According to the newspaper, the Merkury corvette of the Russian Black Sea Fleet arrived in the Kattegat area and conducted reconnaissance for the Yi Peng 3 and transmitted classified information to the headquarters in Kaliningrad. Changes in the routes of the Chinese vessel Yi Peng 3 were recorded in the spring of 2024.
It began calling at Russian ports, including Murmansk and Ust-Luga. Prior to that, the vessel had not visited Russia since 2015.
The Chinese ship Yi Peng 3. Photo credits: Mikkel Berg Pedersen
The reasons for the change of routes in the spring of 2024 remain unknown.
It is unclear whether it was related to the start of cooperation with the Russian side.
Damage to cables in the Baltic Sea
As previously reported, the telecommunications cable was damaged on November 18, 2024, after the Chinese cargo ship Yi Peng 3 passed over it. Finland, Germany, Sweden, and Lithuania reported damage to the cable. Launched in 2016, this cable is the only submarine communication cable that runs directly to Central Europe.
Later, the vessel and its crew were detained by a Royal Danish Navy ship for interrogation and detailed examination of their course and actions in the vicinity of telecommunications cables.
It was reported that the captain of the vessel was a Russian citizen, Alexander Stechentsev.