James Lawless (Kildare North, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the ambassador to the committee. It is good to have H.E. Mr. Filatov here to have this exchange; it is always good to talk.

Like some of my colleagues, my first question to the ambassador is why the Russian Federation chose to have a military exercise in the corner of Irish waters and EU waters in the first place. The Russian Federation cannot have been unaware of the damage to fish stocks and marine life. The fishermen made the ambassador aware of it, if he was not already. Going beyond that, the Irish Government has a programme of legislation to develop our marine potential. I refer to significant infrastructural investment - everything from renewable energy through to the telecommunications and cables that we have already talked about. It is a sensitive and important part of Ireland's footprint - its marine waters. These are also EU waters. It seems very curious that a decision would be taken to have an exercise within a corner of the EU and within a corner of Irish waters.

Deputy Gannon and Senator Ardagh already alluded also to the submarine cables. The ambassador laughed it off with a James Bond reference. Much worse than James Bond happened in the past 50 years. There is a real threat with much of this. It is also a fact, I believe, that there was circling by Russian aircraft of those same submarine cables in the past two years. There was an exercise where aircraft circled for many hours. Potentially, they could have been mapping the plot of those cables. A certain number were in the area. There seems to be ongoing Russian interest in those areas of the cables where they join and I would wonder why that is. In terms of an area, the shipping lane is the naval gateway or approach to Europe where vessels would arrive. All of this prompts the question, "why would you go there in the first place?" If I were to play football, I would not start on my neighbour's lawn. I would go out on the green field outside of it. There is the whole Atlantic Ocean in front of the Russian Federation. Why pick a corner of Europe, and a corner of Ireland, to do it in?

Even though the Russian Federation has moved - I thank the ambassador and his country for taking that decision - there will still be a downstream impact in terms of whatever manoeuvres are performed or whatever military exercises are done, or whatever firing is done. The waters will still be knocked on. The marine life, potentially, will be impacted, even though it is a little further afield.

There was a statement this evening, at approximately 5 p.m., before the meeting started and a question was put to the Irish, either by the ambassador or by his colleagues, asking whether the Government changed its position. I do not know if it has or not. I do not speak for the Government. I am a member of a Government party but I am not a Minister. If it had, if any of us had, could the ambassador blame us? With all we have seen in the past couple of weeks, the activities and the exercise and the fact that the Russian Federation has chosen to perform military exercises in the corner of what is still a neutral country's hinterland, would the ambassador think it unusual or in any way surprising if we had begun to reconsider these issues? It could be said that Russian activity in the past couple of weeks has done more for NATO recruitment in this country than the US ever did in the past 40 years. It is something the ambassador should think about very carefully.

I will be very interested in the ambassador's answer to the final question I put to him. In his opening statement, the ambassador talks about theatres of war and theatres of exercise and about naval, air, etc. The ambassador also talks about cyberspace. There has been significant suggestion that Russia has played an active part in disinformation campaigns and disruption campaigns in the UK, in the US, but also in Western Europe and also within the EU. Has it ever done that in Ireland? Will the ambassador be in a position to advise us on that today? It is a significant concern that Russian disinformation campaigns permeate cyberspace in this country and elsewhere. I look forward to the ambassador's responses, and thank him.