Russian captain sentenced to 3.5 years for damaging cables in the Gulf of Finland

Finland has handed down its first conviction in a case involving damage to submarine cables.

Finnish broadcaster Yle reports.

The Helsinki District Court has sentenced the captain of the cargo ship Fitburg, Russian citizen Andrei Maksimenko, to 3 years and 6 months in prison for damaging submarine cables in the Gulf of Finland. The ship’s boatswain, Azerbaijani citizen Vusal Majidov, received 2 years and 10 months.

Both were convicted of intentional destruction of property without the right to commute the sentence to a suspended sentence and were taken into custody immediately. They must also jointly and severally reimburse the costs of repairing the cables and gas pipeline and for the investigation.

The sentence was harsher than the prosecution’s request, which had requested at least two and a half years. At the same time, the court dismissed the charge of gross obstruction of communications, believing that it fell within the scope of gross destruction of property.

According to the court, on New Year’s Eve last year, the ship dragged its anchor along the seabed for several hours, about 130 kilometers. This damaged two underwater communication cables and threatened seven other communication and power cables, as well as a gas pipeline.

The court found it proven that the anchor locking mechanism was working and that the anchor was raised when the ship left the port of St. Petersburg the day before. The prosecution did not allege that the captain personally ordered the anchor to be lowered, and that the boatswain participated in the lowering. However, the court concluded that both were aware of the lowered anchor when the ship passed the cables and gas pipeline.

In October, the same court closed similar proceedings against the tanker Eagle S. The captain and two mates were acquitted because the court found that jurisdiction belonged to the flag state or the countries of citizenship of the defendants, not Finland. The state then had to reimburse them about 195 thousand euros in legal costs. The defense in the Fitburg case also challenged Finnish jurisdiction, but this time the argument did not work.

The convicted do not admit guilt. In court, Madzhidov said that he was not sure whether it was Fitburg that caused the damage, and Maksymenko claimed that he “did not know about dragging the anchor along the bottom.”

Reference. The 132-meter-long Fitburg sails under the flag of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines. Finnish services detained it on December 31, 2025 on its way from Saint Petersburg to Haifa on suspicion of damaging the cable connecting Helsinki with Tallinn. The cable belongs to the Finnish company Elisa and runs in the exclusive economic zone of Estonia.

All 14 crew members were detained at that time. According to Finnish customs, the ship was carrying Russian steel, which is subject to EU sanctions. Fitburg was released two weeks later, but part of the crew was banned from leaving the country.