The navies of Britain, Finland and Estonia were practicing subsea infrastructure protection in the Baltic Sea region on Monday together with the Finnish Border Guard, Finland’s Defense Forces said in a statement, Paralel.Az reports citing TVP World.

The aim of the joint exercise, which continues on Tuesday, is to develop capabilities for the surveillance and protection of undersea infrastructure and to repel subsea military threats, Finland said.

“After the Balticconnector incident, many countries of the Baltic Sea region have increased their cooperation and their own national maritime surveillance operations,” Commodore Janne Huusko of the Finnish Defense Command said.

All three participants are members of the NATO military alliance but the exercise is taking place under their Joint Expeditionary Force (JEF) defense cooperation, which encompasses the Nordic and Baltic states, the Netherlands and Britain.

Britain said on Thursday it would send seven Royal Navy ships and a maritime patrol aircraft to take part in JEF patrols in the region in December.