Ireland to consider joining EU/Nato-led mission to protect undersea cable

"As a small country, five million people, no matter how much we spend on our Defence Forces, our Navy, we wouldn't be able to do this on our own,” Leo Varadkar said.

Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has said the Government will give “deep consideration” to joining any EU or NATO-led mission to strengthen the protection of undersea cables in the light of suspicions over Russian mapping of the seabed off the Irish coast.

Mr Varadkar was speaking at the European Political Community summit of 46 continental leaders in Moldova on Thursday.

"We will give it deep consideration because we are an island nation, our seas are seven times greater than our land area and going through those seas are a lot of really important infrastructure, communications cables that connect Ireland to the world and Europe to North America and also, for example, our gas interconnector with the UK and our electricity interconnectors both with the UK and new one with France,” Mr Varadkar said.

“So I don’t think we can protect these on our own and therefore it makes sense for us to cooperate with our neighbours and allies both in the EU and in NATO to make sure that those cables are secure no matter what happens but we have to know the detail of any European-led operation on that or any NATO-led cooperation on that before we can make a decision on whether or not to participate.” 

Mr Varadkar said that it was important to ensure that when fibre optic data cables were designed and planned, and when they were replaced, they had to be more secure than in the past.

"Another part of it is monitoring, making sure that we're able to keep an eye on vessels that pass through our economic zone," Mr Varadkar said.

"Another aspect to it is what would you do if there was information about potential interference? And how would we act?

"As a small country, five million people, no matter how much we spend on our Defence Forces, our Navy, we wouldn't be able to do this on our own,” he added.

When asked by reporters if he had received intelligence confirming Russian naval activity around the subsea cables. The Taoiseach said he was limited in what he could say in terms of national security.

But he said the risk of a hybrid attack on Ireland was higher than it was in recent decades.

"We live in a different world now and security threats are hybrid," Mr Varadkar said.

"We've already had a cyber attack on our health service. We need to make sure that nobody's in a position to take down the IT systems around our critical infrastructure, like, for example, our electricity grid.

"It's fair to say that because of the instability in the world at the moment, the risk of us being a victim of an attack or collateral damage in attack, is higher than it would have been ten or 20 years ago, and we need to be realistic about that."