A beluga whale, allegedly trained by Russia, was spotted off the coast of Sweden, according to Swedish authorities.
Norwegian authorities said the whale, which was first seen in the Norwegian Arctic four years ago wearing an apparently Russian-made harness and reportedly coming from a Russian military installation, was spotted off the coast of Sweden some 1,250 miles away. to the south.
According to Swedish channel TV4, Olav Lekve of the Norwegian Directorate of Fisheries said that “during the last few weeks, it moved rapidly and swam several hundred kilometres” before reaching the waters off the Swedish west coast.
Lekve said the whale washed up in Lysekill, which is north of Goteborg, Sweden’s second-largest city. There was no immediate comment from Swedish authorities.
Last week, the white mammal was spotted in Oslo’s Innerfjord, where management urged people to avoid contact with the animal to ensure its safety.
Whale watchers in Norway have nicknamed it “Hvaldimir,” combining the Norwegian word for whale, hval, and the Russian name Vladimir.
The management said there was a risk of injury to Hvaldimir when more recreational boats than usual gathered in the fjord.
This was because people were looking to catch a glimpse of a huge American aircraft carrier, the USS Gerald R Ford, which had briefly visited the Norwegian capital.
Norwegian officials said they did not want to speculate on the whale’s origins.
Carl Bildt, Sweden’s former foreign minister, jokingly suggested to TV4 that Hvaldimir should be granted political asylum in Sweden, saying he “may be a refugee protesting against Putin’s war” in Ukraine.
Beluga whales inhabit cold Arctic and subarctic waters. They can be found in coastal areas, estuaries, and inlets of the Arctic Ocean, as well as in the northern parts of the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.
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