Russian ships damaging UK underwater cables face raid by Royal Marine Commandos, signals Defence Secretary

Russian ships which damage British underwater cables face being raided and seized by Royal Marine Commandos, Defence Secretary John Healey has signalled.

He stressed that the UK was willing to take “the strongest possible response” as part of its “homeland” security operations.

He emphasised that this had been made clear to Vladimir Putin by ordering a Royal Navy submarine to surface close to a suspected Russia spy ship believed to be mapping underwater infrastructure in UK waters.

Mr Healey told Parliament this week how he has changed the Royal Navy’s rules of engagement so it could intervene against “grey war” threats.

The Russian spy ship the Yantar was warned off by the British submarine and headed to the Mediterranean in November.

But it returned recently when it was monitored through the Channel by HMS Somerset before sailing into the North Sea.

“There is definitely evidence of growing Russian aggression, a readiness to push the limits and beyond of international law, it isn’t just British waters,” the Defence Secretary told BBC radio.

He highlighted the case of the Estlink1 undersea power cable in the Baltic Sea which Russia has been accused of sabotaging, a claim it denies.

A ship named as Eagle S was seized by Finland after being suspected of dragging its anchor along the seabed for miles and damaging the cable.

Mr Healey told ITV’s Good Morning Britain: “On Christmas Day when that cable was damaged, it broke the connection between Finland and Estonia, they were part of an operation now that we are working together to monitor the movement of suspected Russian shadow fleet breaking sanctions or their spy ships.

“That tanker was boarded by Finnish commandos, it was seized by Finland, so there is action that nations like us can take if there are damage or suspected sabotage to the cables on which we depend.”

On the threat from Russian “shadow fleet” and spy vessels, he stressed on LBC radio: “We track them, we monitor what they are doing and we are sending the strongest messages that we can to Putin..

“We have to say that we know what he is doing, we have to say that the sort of aggression that he has been behind, the increasing sabotage and damage that we are seeing to undersea cables is a threat to our homeland.

“These are cables that our daily life depends on and it’s one of the major areas of the Strategic Defence Review, how do we reinforce Britain homeland security in an age when we are under increasing threat and those threats are changing.”

The Defence Secretary, who will publish the SDR in the spring, also announced a deal worth around £9 billion had been struck with Rolls-Royce by the Government to help power Britain’s nuclear submarines.

The eight-year contract, dubbed Unity, is aimed at safeguarding 4,000 jobs and creating more than 1,000 others, as well as bolstering national security and the UK economy.