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0:14

student. Last

0:16

week, a mysterious act of sabotage

0:18

with all the hallmarks of what's known as

0:20

hybrid warfare was carried out

0:22

in the Baltic Sea.

0:24

bubbling to the top of the Baltic

0:26

Sea gas leaching from Russia's

0:29

Nord Stream pipelines. European

0:31

officials believe this was the result

0:33

of savage.

0:34

The four separate gas leaks

0:36

posed a safety risk to ships, threatened

0:38

ecosystems, and sent energy

0:41

prices spiraling again. But

0:44

the event also has a sinister implication

0:46

for Russia's war in Ukraine. and

0:48

it's a relationship with Europe. Irrespective

0:50

of who actually did

0:52

that, if that's now a

0:54

new arena of conflict, that means

0:56

that all the member states in the

0:58

EU are going to be looking at what their vulnerabilities

1:01

are.

1:01

If sabotaging critical infrastructure

1:03

is now on the table,

1:05

just how vulnerable

1:06

is Ireland. Attention

1:08

is turning to the submarine cables off

1:10

Ireland's coast, the digital arteries

1:13

that travel across the Atlantic and

1:15

keep our world connected. This

1:17

is how international financial transactions

1:19

are done. It's how, you know, for example,

1:21

video streaming works, It's obviously

1:23

really important, particularly for Ireland

1:26

because of our tech industry. And it throws

1:27

new light on those so called naval

1:30

drills carried out by Russia in Irish

1:32

waters earlier this year. In

1:34

the modern day David and Goliath

1:36

story, I just love this story. Irish fishermen

1:39

are celebrating after Russia backed

1:41

off a plan for live naval exercises

1:43

off the Irish coast. I'm

1:45

Connor Pope, and this is in the news from The Irish

1:47

Times. Today, What does the

1:50

North Stream sabotage mean for Ireland,

1:52

for Europe, and for the world? Naomi

1:56

O'Leary is the archtime's Europe correspondent. Naomi,

1:58

can we start maybe with an Nord Stream one

2:00

and two gas pipelines. They're the

2:02

major gas connections between Russia and

2:04

the EU. And last week, multiple explosions

2:06

were detected along the pipelines. What

2:09

do we know about those explosions and the damage

2:11

that was done?

2:14

Suddenly, there was a

2:16

a loss of pressure. detected along

2:19

the Nord Stream pipelines one

2:21

and two. This

2:22

all happened in a very short

2:25

space of time. and it was established

2:27

that there were a number of leaks where

2:29

initially reported as three. Now

2:31

Sweden is saying it's actually four leaks.

2:34

the Swedish Coast Guard is now clarifying

2:37

that there was this fourth leak already

2:39

to smaller leak than the first one they detected.

2:42

That one This caused huge bubbles

2:45

of gas to rise up

2:47

through the Baltic Sea, which is actually quite

2:49

dangerous for ships. as well as being

2:51

an environmental environmentally damaging.

2:54

Because these leaks suddenly

2:56

happened all at the same time in different locations,

2:59

the conclusion has been that this was deliberate.

3:02

That's what European leaders have been saying.

3:06

We have Swedish intelligence, but we have

3:08

also received information in our contacts

3:10

with Denmark. And based on this concluded

3:13

that this is probably a deliberate act.

3:15

It is probably a matter of sabotage. But

3:18

as to the context of how it was done,

3:20

who did it, that's still very much in

3:23

the air.

3:25

Naomi,

3:31

last week during a ceremony to annex four

3:33

regions of Ukraine and to Russia, Putin

3:36

openly accused Western states of

3:38

blowing up the pipelines. Angela

3:40

Saxons are not happy

3:43

with the sanctions, they

3:45

moved to terrorist

3:46

attacks having

3:48

arranged explosions on

3:50

the gas pipelines in

3:53

the sea. But

3:54

really, I suppose the suspicion is still

3:57

very much that Russia is behind the sabotage

3:59

So

3:59

what have other European leaders said

4:02

about the incidents and have they actually pointed the

4:04

finger at Putin's Russia? They

4:06

just have in general been quite careful not

4:09

to get into attribution at this stage.

4:12

They did come out quite quickly to say that

4:15

this was deliberate. Now,

4:17

Russia, a spokesperson from

4:19

the from Kremlin to Mitra Pescoff

4:21

has said that it's not in their interest to

4:23

do this. The EU said the leaks had been caused

4:26

by sabotage. Russia dismissed those suggestions

4:28

that have attacked its own pipelines as

4:31

predictable and stupid. These

4:34

are the pipelines that deliver gas

4:36

or were delivering gas to the

4:38

EU before the energy disputes. So

4:41

they say, you know, it's not in our interest for this gas

4:43

to be bubbling out into the sky.

4:46

This is we've just lost a way to sell

4:48

our gas to Europe. However, this does

4:50

common context when the

4:52

EU and Russia are in a major energy

4:55

dispute. Mhmm. And so what it's seen as

4:57

is an escalation in that kind of

4:59

dangerous escalation with infrastructure, critical

5:02

infrastructure being hit, which

5:05

just really brings this conflict to a new level.

5:07

And of course, we all know that

5:09

gas markets have been extremely volatile

5:11

in recent months. and we've seen

5:13

price spikes of more than a thousand percent.

5:16

And this news sent prices spiraling

5:18

again, and that's despite the fact that

5:20

the pipelines currently supply very little

5:22

gas to the EU, I think around twenty

5:24

percent. So this

5:26

has been another big step in disrupting

5:29

the energy markets in Europe. And I wonder

5:30

Is it a sign maybe Naomi that

5:33

the market has changed permanently or

5:35

at least for the long term? Yeah. Especially

5:37

if we don't get any kind of gas supplies from Nord

5:39

Stream. So

5:40

neither of these pipelines were at the

5:43

time that they were hit, actually delivering

5:45

gas to the EU. One, because it was

5:47

never switched on due to,

5:49

essentially, the conflict and the changed

5:51

dynamic regarding Russian gas.

5:54

The other one because Russia had

5:56

already turned it off. So

5:58

the gas that's spilling out is just remaining

6:01

gas that was actually inside the pipeline that

6:03

wasn't actually flowing. what this does,

6:05

therefore, it doesn't it doesn't reduce the amount

6:08

of Russian gas that's currently flowing

6:10

to the EU, but it sort of draws a

6:12

line, a full stop on the prospect

6:15

of that supply resuming. So

6:17

really what it's quite serious for

6:20

is next winter. That's what we're hearing is

6:22

that Supply will be very difficult next winter.

6:24

The EU has already filled up all of its

6:27

storage capacity to nearly completely

6:29

full using Russian gas. while

6:32

it was still flowing. But next winter,

6:34

they won't have that option. They'll be relying mostly

6:36

on LNG. So there's very,

6:39

very little Russian gas coming to Europe now.

6:41

It's already dropped to from about forty percent

6:43

of the EU's gas needs to about nine

6:45

percent and -- Okay. -- and

6:47

the Russian energy giant gas from

6:49

has suggested it may turn off the

6:51

last remaining tap or

6:53

a route which runs through Ukraine.

6:56

And of

6:56

course, some analysts have been suggesting in

6:58

recent days this Russia is behind

7:00

this and they're behind

7:02

it because they want to threaten European

7:04

infrastructure and they're making this point

7:06

that they could attack other pipelines. For example,

7:09

there's a new pipeline between Norway and Poland

7:11

that could be similarly targeted. if

7:14

that's true, it's kind of frightening, isn't it? Because

7:16

that would mean that Russia is now

7:19

willing to escalate the conflict in

7:21

a way that could make life very uncomfortable

7:23

for us, but could also see the conflict

7:26

spilling over into Europe in a more meaningful

7:28

way.

7:29

with attacks like this, mysterious

7:32

sabotage, a lot of the time

7:35

in order to place attribution, context

7:37

is relied upon. And that's probably

7:40

why analysts are looking to Russia

7:42

because the context is that the

7:44

EU and Russia are in a dispute over

7:46

energy. And the

7:49

reasons that you come up with why Russia

7:51

might want to do this is to

7:53

again send gas prices higher,

7:56

which their previous

7:58

acts in terms of further switching off pipelines

8:01

and stuff, they had had unlimited ability

8:04

to do so. So they were sort of hitting

8:06

a wall with how much further they could push

8:08

the gas price up. This reintroduced

8:12

serious instability. It also,

8:15

like you say, it raises the atmosphere

8:17

of tension and insecurity. It

8:19

has EU leaders asking

8:22

themselves, where else might be vulnerable?

8:25

What else could be hit? They're

8:27

scrambling now to increase security on

8:29

other critical infrastructure. And

8:31

so this does have some of the hallmarks

8:34

of a hybrid war and

8:36

attack in that it's

8:38

difficult to place attribution, and

8:41

it seems to be seeking to influence

8:44

the decision making of the target. while

8:47

falling below the thresholds of attribution

8:50

of the kind of level

8:53

of attack that would trigger retaliation.

8:56

Now, you mentioned a phrase there hybrid

8:58

war, and you've been writing in

9:00

the Irish times about this hybrid warfare

9:03

tool kit. I'd say for a lot of

9:05

people that phrase is entirely new.

9:07

So what does it mean?

9:09

Hybrid word refers to this

9:11

gray area. which is

9:15

it's a it's a characteristic of

9:17

current day conflict in that you

9:19

don't have the traditional clear cut

9:22

a hot and cold complex, but you have

9:24

a whole area of attacks

9:26

which are difficult to classify. Sometimes

9:29

it's unclear where they're coming

9:31

from, they might not even be detected.

9:34

And as I say, there's a lot of

9:36

dancing around the level of

9:39

severity of attacks that would trigger

9:41

response. So in recent years,

9:43

we've seen an increase in

9:46

these methods that become more characteristic

9:49

of current geopolitics. And

9:51

we've also seen an increase

9:53

in the phenomenon of mysterious critical

9:56

infrastructure sabotage. So

9:58

a tax on infrastructure which are really quite

10:00

hard to pin down in terms of who

10:02

was responsible.

10:03

Can

10:06

you

10:06

give me any examples in Naomi of these

10:08

kind of attacks? Like, where

10:11

have we seen them and who's been targeted? Sure.

10:13

Well,

10:14

a major turning point in this was

10:16

the attacks in Estonia in two thousand and

10:19

seven. That happened at

10:21

a time of tension when the local

10:23

Russian population

10:24

of Estonia were

10:26

rioting over the proposed

10:29

removal of a Soviet

10:30

era monument.

10:33

So it came at a time of tension. Suddenly,

10:36

there were waves of really extreme cyberattacks

10:40

on all key Astonian critical

10:42

infrastructure. So banks, media,

10:45

telecommunications, waves of

10:47

them all happening at the same time. This

10:50

was attributed to Russian

10:52

sources, mostly due to context,

10:55

and it's seen as a turning point in

10:59

kind of a demonstration of what hybrid

11:01

attacks can do. This really

11:03

it grind the country to hold and

11:06

it also It was a turning point

11:08

for Estonia in terms of building its

11:10

digital security. Since

11:12

then, we've seen

11:15

cyberattacks have become a feature. of

11:17

of modern life. And just as

11:19

in Estonia, it's often very difficult

11:21

to distinguish. Are they criminal

11:24

groups acting independently? Are

11:26

they criminal groups that have the backing of a state?

11:29

Or are they just state forces

11:31

which are masquerading as criminal groups? This

11:33

is very difficult to sort out. And

11:36

like I say, a lot of the time you rely

11:38

on context to interpret who

11:40

could be responsible. So

11:42

there's been a large scale attacks

11:44

on electricity networks. For

11:46

example, the Dutch electricity network

11:49

was taken offline not too long ago.

11:52

And something that might be relevant to

11:54

our discussion now is the

11:56

attacks in France on fiber optic

11:59

cables.

12:01

France's internet is down after

12:03

suspected strikes. Internet

12:05

success was delayed or unavailable in

12:07

numerous French towns on Wednesday

12:09

as result of suspected attacks on

12:12

fiber optic cables. According

12:14

to media report Can you tell me little bit about

12:16

those attacks in France nearly?

12:17

Yeah. So to run through what happened there

12:19

earlier this year, fiber optic

12:22

cables were essentially dug up and caught

12:25

in a number of key

12:27

locations in a coordinated way

12:29

overnight. This

12:32

came to light in April. It knocked

12:34

out Internet access and phone

12:36

access in different regions of France.

12:38

And what had been targeted were the these

12:41

important sort of highways of information that

12:43

connect different French regions to

12:45

the Internet? So these

12:47

cables were dug up in several

12:49

locations all at once and they

12:51

were cut in a way that made them really difficult to

12:54

repair. so that they would be taken offline

12:56

for, you know, a significant period.

12:58

And what's kind of even stranger is that a

13:00

similar thing happened in twenty twenty

13:02

in the Paris region Again,

13:05

fiber optic cables were dug up

13:07

and cost in this coordinated way.

13:09

Like, it was planned, like someone knew how

13:11

it had looked at how the system worked. and

13:14

had deliberately attacked in several

13:16

points once in order to cause the maximum

13:18

disruption and tens of thousands of people

13:20

lost their Internet connection. temporarily

13:22

due to that incident. Mhmm.

13:25

Both of the incidents of

13:27

sabotage are are mysterious. They're

13:29

mysterious critical infrastructure attacks

13:32

that haven't been clearly attributed. I

13:34

suppose

13:34

a question then is, what's the point of an

13:36

attack like that? I mean, if no one claims responsibility

13:39

for it, what does it achieve? because

13:41

I would imagine digging up fiber optic

13:43

cables and cutting them in in such a

13:45

way as to make them very difficult

13:47

to to reattach. Like, that's a complex

13:50

operation. Who does this and why?

13:52

What

13:52

we don't know is the short answer.

13:55

If a state wanted to do something like

13:57

that, it could be an interest doing exercise

13:59

to find out information, to

14:01

test out the results of

14:03

a certain action, and to,

14:06

yeah, to figure out where the weak points

14:08

are. That's one of this this sort

14:10

of deciding factors in in this kind of

14:12

infrastructure attack. It's opportunistic.

14:15

what tend to be targeted are weak points

14:17

and whether

14:19

these are cyberattacks or

14:21

physical sabotage. So

14:23

we we don't know is the short answer

14:25

to that.

14:29

Coming up, just how vulnerable

14:32

is Ireland to these kinds of critical

14:34

infrastructure attacks.

14:42

And I suppose you

14:44

mentioned cyberattacks and we're all too familiar

14:46

with the consequences of a cyber attack in this country.

14:48

I mean, it it seems like a long time ago now, but

14:50

the the HSE ransomware attack was

14:52

a really big deal. The HSE

14:55

says it's working to contain a very

14:57

sophisticated human operated ransomware

15:00

attack on its IT systems. However,

15:02

no ransom demand has yet been made.

15:05

Is there any sense that that was a kind of an

15:07

opportunistic testing of our systems?

15:09

Or was that just a criminal enterprise? Or do

15:11

we know? It's

15:12

very difficult to distinguish in many cases

15:14

because you could have the simple profit

15:16

motive, or yes, it could be

15:18

a test. In that case, there's

15:20

a, you know, there's a lot of valuable data,

15:23

which was probably stolen in that occasion.

15:25

And so there's, you know, there's motive

15:28

for whether it's criminal actors or whether

15:30

it's state actors to do it or some

15:32

sort of combination of the two. But,

15:34

yes, certainly in I

15:36

won't speak about the HSE attack

15:38

specifically, but in general, yes, cyber

15:40

attacks can

15:43

have that kind of blend of criminal

15:45

and state backing where it's difficult to

15:47

distinguish the two, but they're probably going after

15:50

data. causing insecurity, testing

15:52

for weak points, figuring out what

15:54

the responses could be, generally increasing

15:57

security, and yeah,

15:59

changing the decision making of the target is

16:01

key.

16:05

You can imagine of the two of us right here

16:07

and in Iraq because flying over

16:09

your head and you're going Jesus what was that?

16:11

Irish fishermen worried about rockets that would

16:13

be fired as part of a Russian military

16:16

exercise off the Irish post this

16:18

week. We don't want anyone doing life where

16:20

in our water's life. It's it's

16:22

our backyard. It's where we make our living.

16:25

Now earlier this year, just before

16:27

Russia invaded Ukraine, in fact, Irish fishermen

16:29

made headlines when they sought to stop

16:32

this Russian fleet carrying out exercises

16:34

in Irish waters.

16:35

Irish fishermen are celebrating

16:37

after Russia backed off a plan for

16:39

live naval exercises off the Irish

16:42

coast. The fishermen worried about their

16:44

livelihoods and called the Russian ambassador.

16:47

Some even declared they would peacefully disrupt

16:49

the war games.

16:50

And there was speculation at the time

16:52

that those exercises were effectively a

16:55

Russian fact finding mission. A test

16:57

of EU weak spots when it comes to critical

16:59

underwater infrastructure Do we have any

17:01

more clarity now as to whether that might

17:03

have been the case?

17:05

I think the suspicions were raised about

17:08

that being an intelligence gathering operation

17:10

by Russia because Russian

17:13

has spy ships, spies submarines

17:15

that undertake surveillance. and

17:17

the particular geographical location

17:20

that the naval exercises were planned

17:22

for happens to be where these

17:24

crucial submarine cables

17:27

come up over the Atlantic shelf

17:30

and are at their shallowest point. So if you wanted

17:32

to go and look at them, try and figure out

17:34

how many cables are there, what kind

17:36

are they? Where are they exactly pinpoint

17:38

the location? That would be a good point to

17:40

do it. So for those reasons, there

17:42

were suspicions that the true intention behind

17:44

those exercises was intelligence

17:47

gathering. Now

17:48

you mentioned cables and I suppose one of the difficulties

17:50

we might have getting our heads around this

17:52

kind of stuff is all of this stuff is invisible

17:54

to us. We don't see all of these cables. Are

17:57

there many of them running across the Atlantic?

17:59

And, like, are are is there much

18:01

of that critical infrastructure in Irish

18:03

waters aren't close to Ireland?

18:06

Yeah. Ireland is a really significant a confirmed

18:08

fulcrum for data

18:10

flows. In total, there's roughly

18:13

four hundred of these submarine fiber

18:15

optic cables around the world. And what

18:17

they are is really the arteries of

18:19

the digital age. This is how international

18:21

financial transactions are done. It's

18:23

how, you know, for example, video streaming

18:26

works. if you're accessing your

18:28

documents online, if they're still stored in

18:30

some sort of cloud service, they may

18:32

well be traveling to along these cables.

18:34

they're not very wide.

18:37

They're only about the width of a garden hose.

18:39

So they are quite physically vulnerable.

18:42

They can sometimes be certainly snapped

18:44

by fishing craft, for example. And

18:46

yet Ireland has roughly sixteen

18:49

of them running off its coast

18:51

It's obviously really important, particularly

18:54

for Ireland because of our tech industry. Mhmm.

18:56

We have the headquarters of

18:58

the major multinational tech companies

19:01

for all of Europe based in Ireland.

19:03

So it's particularly important for that. And because

19:06

we have so many data centers and we have

19:08

quite a digitalized economy, the

19:10

importance of these cables is that

19:13

it's really how international communication

19:15

works. Now, we

19:17

could look at some past examples of times

19:20

when cables were damaged

19:22

or cut to look at what could

19:24

happen. were they to be targeted in

19:27

a critical infrastructure attack?

19:31

Vietnam at one point, last

19:34

one of its two major submarine

19:36

cables, one connecting it with Hong

19:38

Kong. And the government at

19:40

the time blamed it on fishermen. They

19:42

said that fishermen had accidentally

19:45

actually pulled it up for scrap. And

19:47

this took many, many weeks to prepare,

19:49

but luckily Vietnam had another alternative

19:52

connection running to China, which

19:54

it was able to rely on for that period.

19:57

So you might see, say, a slowing down

19:59

in the Internet, but it wouldn't

20:01

be caught outright. Now

20:03

that underlines something important, which

20:05

is that there because there's a network of these

20:08

cables which has become more

20:10

and more complex. You could

20:12

have Internet traffic reroofed

20:14

if a cable was to be caught or damaged and

20:16

actually that does happen all the time because they do, as I

20:18

say, accidentally get cut by things like Machine Craft.

20:21

So you could have data flows rerouted. If

20:24

an actor wanted to cause

20:27

the maximum disruption through

20:29

sabotage. What they would want to do

20:31

is study this network carefully

20:33

and hit several places at once

20:36

in order to prevent data traffic

20:38

simply being rerouted and to make it

20:40

as onerous as possible to

20:42

repair. And

20:44

do you think Naomi Ireland is particularly

20:47

vulnerable to attacks on this critical

20:49

infrastructure because of our island status

20:51

and are relatively small

20:54

military setup?

20:55

Yeah. Ireland, think it's

20:58

broadly considered to be particularly vulnerable

21:01

because we don't actually currently have much capacity

21:04

to monitor those cables or

21:06

indeed our our fishing waters or,

21:08

you know, our territorial waters. We

21:10

don't have the ability to actually see

21:13

and know what's going on because of

21:15

our limited naval capacity in like

21:17

radar and so on. And we also

21:19

apart from monitoring and just like

21:22

seeing gathering information and so on.

21:24

We don't have much of a ability

21:26

to guard and defend that infrastructure

21:29

either. So, yeah, we are particularly vulnerable.

21:32

We would probably need to rely on

21:34

international allies if such thing

21:36

were to happen. which is something that

21:38

happened to happen actually in the

21:40

cyber attack on the HSE where

21:43

we we did get help from from

21:45

the EU in terms of bringing everything back

21:47

online. So, yeah, it's

21:49

definitely a vulnerable point.

21:51

And is that vulnerability concern

21:54

in the corridors of power in the EU. I mean,

21:56

is it something that people within the European

21:58

Union are talking about? Like, what do we do about

22:00

Ireland and is Ireland the weak

22:02

underbelly of the European Union's information

22:04

architecture. I

22:06

don't think it is top of

22:08

mind for most people at the moment,

22:10

mostly because Ireland is relatively geographically

22:12

distant from the sort of hot spots

22:16

at the moment. You do definitely

22:18

hear from analysts, the military analysts

22:21

that Ireland is a bit of a weak point.

22:23

We de facto kind of fall under

22:25

the NATO umbrella because the

22:27

British RAF is

22:29

called out to has scrambled

22:31

jets to escort, for example,

22:34

Russian craft out of our airspace

22:36

when they've been there probably

22:38

testing RAF response times.

22:41

So it's not a major topic of conversation.

22:44

But yeah, it definitely there definitely, I think, is

22:46

an awareness that, you know, Ireland isn't

22:48

doesn't have much military means.

22:51

That's that's definitely the

22:53

case. I think there's also an

22:55

awareness that this is a really delicate domestic

22:58

debate in Ireland -- Mhmm. -- and something that

23:00

Irish politicians and the Irish public

23:02

have to sort of talk about and

23:05

decide among themselves.

23:08

So as you say, we're we're kind reliant

23:10

on others the US, the UK, NATO,

23:13

the European Union,

23:15

can we rely on these people? And where

23:17

there to be a major crisis or

23:19

whether to be a major terrorist attack

23:21

on this critical infrastructure coming

23:23

into Ireland. Do you reckon they come

23:25

and help us out? I

23:27

think definitely yes. That's

23:30

part of the deal I think of

23:32

being in the EU that allies would

23:35

would come to our aid. It's also in the interests

23:38

of the U. S. and

23:40

also the UK and the EU not

23:42

to have Ireland's and

23:44

vulnerable are suffering from an attack, so I think

23:46

they definitely would be help for sure.

23:49

So something that military analysts point

23:52

out, though, is that there is a cost

23:54

to that kind of reliance. And

23:57

it's that Ireland has to

23:59

ask for help and it doesn't necessarily

24:01

get to set its own strategic objectives.

24:04

So it's others who are sort of

24:06

setting the strategic objective

24:08

and then Ireland has to just

24:10

go along with it. You can you can ask

24:12

for help, but it does it limits

24:15

the amount of maneuver that Ireland

24:17

has strategically.

24:19

And I suppose finally, Naomi, with

24:22

this Sabotage

24:25

on the Nord Stream pipelines, and

24:27

this increased targeting of critical

24:29

infrastructure Across

24:31

the European Union, is there now more tension

24:34

over

24:34

the relationship that exists between the EU

24:36

and Russia than the Wars even?

24:38

six weeks ago, like, are things getting worse? because

24:40

it certainly seems on the surface like they are getting

24:42

much worse.

24:43

Yes. Definitely, this

24:46

sabotage on the pipelines is

24:48

viewed as having brought this conflict

24:51

to the new level. If infrastructure

24:53

sabotage is now on the table, irrespective

24:56

of who actually did that,

24:58

who actually damaged the Nord Stream pipelines,

25:01

if that's now a new arena

25:03

of conflict, that means that

25:06

all the member states in

25:08

the EU are going to be looking at what their vulnerabilities

25:10

are. It's just another thing

25:13

for them to have to worry about. You

25:15

mentioned, you know, there was

25:17

some talk of the vulnerability potentially of

25:19

the new Baltic pipe between Poland

25:22

and Norway. that was

25:24

opened pretty much simultaneously as

25:27

these attacks occurred. So that's a kind

25:29

of a significant context. That

25:31

pipeline that was open between Norway and

25:33

Poland was celebrated as a way for

25:35

the EU to move away from energy

25:37

dependence on Russia So

25:40

it's kind of a meaningful moment

25:42

for such an attack to happen. And

25:45

it underlines that you

25:47

know, what's what's being

25:49

targeted here is Europe's energy security.

25:52

It's proved a very effective thing

25:55

for Russia to target in terms of getting

25:57

results. It's really had very

25:59

significant economic and

26:02

social and political result

26:05

playing on the vulnerabilities of

26:08

Europe's energy needs.

26:09

Naomi, Larry. Thank you very much for talk

26:11

to us. Thank you.

26:16

That's it for today. This episode

26:19

of In The News was juice by Suzanne Brennan,

26:21

Decathlon Conlon and Nadine Finnegan. We'll

26:24

be back on Wednesday.