LONDON

Finnish police have formally arrested two crew members of the Fitburg, a vessel suspected of damaging a submarine telecommunications cable in the Gulf of Finland, public broadcaster Yle reported on Friday.

The two crew members were held while two others are under travel ban after the cargo ship, suspected of breaking a data cable between Finland and Estonia on New Year’s Eve on Wednesday, was seized by the Finnish authorities.

Authorities began interrogations of crew members on Thursday and also launched an underwater investigation of the site around the broken cable.

Police declined to comment on the nationalities of the individuals but it was reported that the 14 crew members who were taken into custody are Russian, Georgian, Kazakh, and Azerbaijani nationals.

Meanwhile, Defense Minister Antti Hakkanen confirmed that Russia has offered assistance to the ship’s crew. Russia has always offered some kind of assistance in cases of hybrid influencing, he told Finnish daily Iltalehti.

"Investigative measures have been carried out on the ship and the crew has been interviewed. We are now assessing the situation and the role of the crew," Detective Superintendent Risto Lohi of the National Bureau of Investigation was quoted by the Yle as saying.

In a statement on Wednesday, police said the cable damage was detected earlier in the day and that the Finnish Border Guard located a vessel, Fitburg, whose actions are suspected to be linked to the incident.

Finnish authorities subsequently seized the ship in a joint operation as the suspected vessel was encountered by the Border Guard’s patrol ship Turva, supported by a helicopter, in Finland’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ).

The reported location of the cable damage itself lies in Estonia’s EEZ, according to information provided by Elisa, a telecommunications and digital services company, between Helsinki and Tallinn.

The cargo ship was believed to be en route from Russia's St. Petersburg to Haifa, Israel, carrying a cargo of steel.

The incident occurred in the Gulf of Finland, a strategically important maritime area hosting several critical energy and data connections linking Nordic and Baltic states.