LONDON -- The European Union is working on plans to lay Arctic submarine cables to connect to Japan South Korea via Greenland, although a lack of urgency in Tokyo is a drag on the project, experts said.

As Europe faces the threat of Russian sabotage to its subsea infrastructure, its leadership recently unveiled a new Arctic strategy to boost resilience in digital connectivity, marking a shift to focus on security from climate previously. Among the new initiatives under this strategy is the establishment of a maritime security hub and joint icebreaker procurement.

Recent military activity and suspected Russian sabotage of undersea infrastructure have raised anxiety in European capitals. Added to this stress, China has launched commercial freight services via the Arctic to Europe at a time when the U.S. is threatening to annex Greenland.

The EU sees it as imperative to diversify and connect to Asian allies to protect such critical infrastructure. Submarine cables carry over 99% of international data traffic and underpin crucial services including financial transactions, cloud computing and international aviation.

Last year, the Swedish Research Council and NORDUnet -- a collaboration between research institutions in Denmark, Iceland, Norway, Sweden and Finland -- launched the first phase of Polar Connect, aimed at mapping an undersea fiber optic cable route and building a new icebreaker. They completed the survey last month and are running the second phase concurrently to design the submarine cable system and determine the optimal route, aiming to link the northern Nordic region to Japan and South Korea by 2031.

A more advanced, and complementary, commercial project, the Far North Fiber, is also conducting route marine surveys, with Finland's Cinia, America's Far North Digital and Canada's True North Global Networks as partners.

The difference between the two projects is that preparatory work for the Polar Connect is entirely funded by governments and plans to lay cables directly across the Arctic Ocean, north of Canada's Arctic archipelago, while the Far North Fiber is aiming to go through the Northwestern Passage in Greenland's territory.

"The value of these projects lies in their potential to diversify Asia-Europe network connectivity away from the increasingly unstable Suez Canal," said Juha Saunavaara, an associate professor at Hokkaido University, noting that 90% of direct data traffic passes through the Suez corridor.

However, securing greater public-sector involvement in Japan, given the projects' strategic importance, has "proven challenging." Saunavaara said that the Japanese government considers the development of submarine cables to be a private-sector project.

Yet, the difficulty of the task, the harsh operating conditions and expensive maintenance make it hard for companies to justify the investment, without state support.

Athena Tong, a visiting researcher at the University of Tokyo's Research Center for Advanced Science and Technology called on the Japanese government for more commitment to sharing the financial risk.

"There is a clear case for governments to help fund it, because the benefits of a more resilient network extend beyond the companies selling cable capacity," said Tong.

To that end, a great deal of diplomatic weight has been put into building stronger relationships with Canada, Japan and South Korea, according to Marc Lanteigne, a political science professor at the Arctic University of Norway.

Surveying the Arctic Ocean. (Courtesy of Polar Connect) A previous effort to plot such a path along Russia's Arctic coast was dropped due to security concerns. Until 2021, Finnish cybersecurity company Cinia was leading a project to run a cable north of Siberia, with Russian companies as well as China's Huawei Marine Networks floated as potential partners. The project was eventually cancelled due to costs and security concerns.

While the EU is worried about Beijing's Arctic ambitions, China was mentioned only once in the paper it released recently. Jo Inge Bekkevold, a senior China fellow at the Norwegian Institute for Defence Studies, found this "somewhat surprising." "It seems that the EU's new strategy pays more attention to building strong European links with Greenland -- as a response to U.S. Greenland policy -- than balancing Chinese interests," said the former Norwegian diplomat.

Greenland, however, was repeatedly referred to in the paper. U.S. President Donald Trump has argued that U.S. ownership of the autonomous Danish territory was necessary to defend the island, rather than relying on existing military-access agreements.

Ultimately, the EU's plan shows its greater willingness to work with Asian allies such as Japan and South Korea.

"The fact that Japan is mentioned in the EU's policy may raise discussion about whether Japan should reflect this somehow in its own policy," Saunavaara said, but he warned that Japan's ongoing investment in Russian hydrocarbon projects could complicate the matter.

Japan is preparing a new Arctic policy paper, although some have said that Tokyo sees it as an opportunity to promote dialogue over Arctic development as well as a potential catalyst to revive engagement with Russia. Clement Ngu is a contributing writer.