Day: February 12, 2024

Oslo — Europe’s increased dependence on Norway’s oil and gas has made the country’s energy installations more at risk of attack, the head of one of the agencies charged with securing them told Reuters on Monday.

Norway in 2022 overtook Russia as Europe’s biggest supplier of natural gas as Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine upended decades-long energy ties and sent prices soaring.

“I am concerned about dependency, and there is no doubt that Europe has become more dependent on Norwegian gas,” Lars Christian Aamodt, head of the National Security Authority, said in an interview.

“As soon as the dependency increases, so will the threat and the risk,” he said, speaking after Norway’s three intelligence agencies presented their respective annual threat assessments.

Aamodt’s agency said European dependency on Norwegian oil and gas could rise further should conflicts in the Middle East disrupt the petroleum market.

In addition, Norwegian oil and gas installations could be hit by “accidents, physical sabotage and destructive cyberattacks”, the country’s military intelligence service (E-service) said in its separate report.

Russian surveillance and mapping of Norwegian infrastructure is continuing as “business as usual”, Admiral Nils Andreas Stensoenes, director of the E-service, told Reuters.

“They continue the surveillance program and that is also very, very little affected by the war [in Ukraine],” he added.

‘Eye opener’

An incident last October under the Baltic Sea, when a seabed gas pipeline and a telecom cable connecting Finland and Estonia were damaged, was an “eye opener” about the risk of sabotage, the head of the police security agency said.

“It has raised awareness for many, also in Norway,” PST Chief Beate Gangaas told Reuters.

Finnish police have named Chinese container ship NewNew Polar Bear as the prime suspect, saying its anchor dragged across the seabed. They have yet to conclude whether it was an accident or a deliberate act.

Two more cables, one connecting Sweden and Estonia and a Russian one, were also damaged around that time.

KINSHASA — Police in Democratic Republic of Congo fired tear gas Monday to disperse protesters who burned tires and U.S. and Belgian flags near Western embassies and U.N. offices in the capital Kinshasa, angry about insecurity in eastern Congo.

The protesters, seizing on a new tactic by targeting embassies, say the West supports neighboring Rwanda, which is accused of backing the Tutsi-led M23 rebellion whose advance is threatening the strategic city of Goma in the east.

Rwanda has denied the accusations. Congo, Western governments including the United States and Belgium, and a United Nations expert group say the rebel group benefits from Rwandan support.

Despite security being stepped up after U.N. staff and vehicles were attacked on Saturday, groups of protesters gathered at the U.S. and French embassies and the offices of the United Nations mission in Congo known as MONUSCO.

Some threw stones, attempting to break the surveillance cameras at one of the United States embassy offices, while others chanted “Leave our country, we don’t want your hypocrisy.”

“The Westerners are behind the looting of our country, Rwanda doesn’t work alone, so they must leave our country,” said Pepin Mbindu, who joined the protest.

Onlookers cheered as one demonstrator removed the EU flag from the entrance of a large hotel in central Kinshasa, according to videos shared on X. Reuters has not authenticated the video.

“The international community remains silent while Congolese are being killed; they finance Rwanda,” said Fabrice Malumba, a motorcycle driver participating in the demonstration in front of the United States embassy.

Police fired tear gas and chased protesters.

Congo’s Vice Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Christophe Lutundula met ambassadors and heads of diplomatic missions in Kinshasa on Sunday. He said security measures would be taken to protect their representations.

“As you can see, we are ensuring the security of the partner embassies of the Democratic Republic of Congo in accordance with the Vienna Convention,” General Blaise Mbula Kilimba Limba, Kinshasa police chief, told Reuters.

Decades of conflicts in eastern Congo between myriad rival armed groups over land and resources and brutal attacks on civilians have killed hundreds of thousands of people and displaced more than 7 million.

Congo is the world’s top supplier of cobalt and Africa’s top copper producer.