Crew on board an oil tanker accused of sabotaging undersea power and communications cables in the Baltic Sea were poised to cut other cables and pipelines when Finnish authorities boarded the vessel last month,

On Dec. 26, Finnish authorities seized oil tanker Eagle S carrying Russian oil. They said they suspected the vessel had damaged the Finnish-Estonian Estlink 2 power line and four telecoms cables by dragging its anchor across the seabed for more than 100 km (60 miles).

"Had it continued for another 12 minutes, the carnage would have been much worse than the four basic cables that were there," Finnish President Alexander Stubb said.