>Shunxing39 cargo vessel is heading for Pusan after Taipei suggests anchor-dragging was ‘sabotage’ >Taiwan has asked South Korea for assistance investigating a Chinese-owned ship suspected of cutting a subsea cable off its northern coast on Friday. >Taiwan telecoms operator Chunghwa Telecom and the Taiwan Coast Guard said on Saturday that the cargo vessel Shunxing39 was believed to have caused damage to a communications cable — close to the port of Keelung on Taiwan’s north coast — on the morning of January 3. >It follows incidents where Chinese ships came under scrutiny when fibre optic cables in the Baltic Sea were severed last November and a gas pipeline and cable were damaged there in October 2023. The latest occurrence highlights the vulnerability of crucial offshore communications and energy infrastructure and the difficulties in prosecuting sabotage. >While the ship sails under Cameroon’s flag, Taiwan officials said it was owned by Jie Yang Trading Limited. The Hong Kong-registered company’s only listed director is Guo Wenjie, a mainland China citizen. >Chunghwa Telecom said data connections were immediately restored by rerouting data to other international subsea cables. . . [Source](https://www.ft.com/content/be994bfb-7299-4334-829d-230dddbc7e25)