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Deep down on the bottom of the Baltic Sea, Swedish treasure hunters think they have made the find of a lifetime. The problem is, they're not exactly sure what it is they've uncovered.

MARIEHAMN, Finland – An accent of mushrooms merged with sweet notes of honey in a sampling Wednesday of what's been billed as the world's oldest champagne, salvaged from a shipwreck in the Baltic Sea. An expert who tasted the vintage bubbly was lyrical, detecting hints of chanterelles and linden blossom. An Associated Press reporter, who also sampled a bottle, found only a slight fizz and flavors of yeast and honey. The champagne — of the brands Veuve Clicquot and the now defunct Juglar — was recovered from a shipwreck discovered in July near the Aland Islands, between Sweden and Finland....

The military airlifted the suspected hijackers of the Arctic Sea and most of its Russian crew from Cape Verde to Moscow on Thursday, after the lumber freighter mysteriously vanished and reappeared in the Atlantic. Eleven of the 15 crew members arrived in Moscow, while the captain and three sailors remained on the ship, which was adrift about 200 nautical miles from the West African island nation of Cape Verde. Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov said the freighter was sailing to the Black Sea port of Novorossiisk. The sailors and their suspected captors arrived in two separate Il-76 cargo jets at the...

Russia has retrieved its Arctic Sea shipping vessel that was hijacked and charged the offenders. The story doesn’t end there, though, as reports continue to surface alleging the “hijacking” were Israeli operatives sent to intercept missiles headed to Iran.. Other reports indicate the Russians staged their own hijacking after being notified of the ship’s contents by Israel. Regardless of who the hijackers were, they have thwarted a shipment of weapons that would have raised the stakes in the region for Israel and possibly even provoked military conflict. On July 24, the Arctic Sea was hijacked by eight individuals while it...

A waitress who works on a Baltic Sea ferry is suing her employers after they refused to give her sick pay while she was recovering from cosmetic breast surgery. The waitress, who was born in 1981, took two weeks off from work last autumn to recover from the operation, which she admits was not for medical reasons. When the ferry company, Viking Line, found out why she had taken sick leave, bosses refused to give her sick pay and docked the time from her holiday allowance. Now, union bosses are taking Viking Line to the labour court. Documents submitted to...

Be aware: "The Swedish military is set to shell out billions of kronor for two new state-of the-art submarines while also upgrading two older vessels, defence minister Sten Tolgfors has revealed, defence minister Sten Tolgfors has revealed. Writing in the Sunday edition of Stockholm daily Svenska Dagbladet, the minister conceded that the Baltic Sea area remained stable, with only Kaliningrad and St. Petersburg breaking the circle of EU and NATO-affiliated countries. "However, one can never rule out long-term risks and incidents, which could also be of a military nature," Tolgfors wrote. The multi-billion kronor investment is to be included in...

A passenger ferry with nearly 1,000 people on board broke free early this morning from heavy pack ice that had trapped it for hours in the Baltic Sea off Sweden's east coast. Dozens of other ships remained stuck and are awaiting assistance after gale-force winds built up large ice masses along the Swedish coastline. Three ice breakers helped release the ferry Amorella at the edge of an archipelago north of Stockholm, while rescue helicopters and military hovercraft had been placed on standby to evacuate passengers if needed. Nobody was hurt and the ferry, carrying 753 passengers and 190 crew, was...

<p>Around 50 ships, including large ferries carrying thousands of people, are stuck in the ice in the Baltic Sea and many were not likely to be freed for hours, Swedish maritime authorities said.</p> <p>"Around 50 commercial vessels are waiting for help from ice breakers (and) we have had as many as six large passenger ferries stuck, but have managed to free two of them," Johny Lindvall of the Swedish Maritime Administration's ice breaker unit told AFP.</p>

In a dangerous legacy of the world's deadliest conflict, 150,000 World War Two-era sea mines litter the Baltic Sea. The danger these bombs pose to a proposed gas pipeline has prompted Russia to hire the British firm Bactec International to clear the sea of unexploded ordnance. And for Bactec, that means it's time to bring out the robots. Bactec, which previously worked clearing mines from around the Falkland Islands, will use a specially designed robot to scour the ocean floor in search of the 70 bombs blocking the path of the pipeline. When the robot finds a mine, a surface...

The former commander of the Russian navy's Baltic fleet on Friday denied Swedish media reports that Russia dumped radioactive and chemical waste into Swedish waters in the Baltic Sea in the early 1990s. "This is complete nonsense and a clear provocation, propagated at an international level," Admiral Vladimir Yegorov, who commanded the Baltic fleet from 1991 to 2000, told the Interfax news agency. Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt on Thursday called for the previous governments to explain a television report that Russia dumped chemical weapons and radioactive waste off the shores of a Swedish island in the Baltic Sea. According...

An installation test flight of the BrahMos supersonic cruise missile is scheduled to take place this year in the Baltic Sea from a stealth frigate being built for the Indian Navy at Kaliningrad in Russia, A. Sivathanu Pillai, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, BrahMos Aerospace Limited, said on Tuesday. The missile’s vertical launcher and fire control system, made in India, was transported to Kaliningrad and fitted into the stealth frigate, a Talwar-class ship. Dr. Pillai disclosed this when Russian National Security Advisor Nikolai Patroshev, along with Ambassador Alexander Kadakin, visited the BrahMos Complex in New Delhi. The BrahMos missile...

A search is under way for a cargo ship which may have travelled through the English Channel after apparently being hijacked by pirates. Coastguards fear the Maltese-flagged Arctic Sea, carrying 15 Russian crew, was hijacked in the Baltic sea. UK authorities made contact before it entered the Strait of Dover but the Russian navy told the Itar-Tass agency it was now looking for the ship. The Maritime and Coastguard Agency said the situation was "bizarre". Spokesman Mark Clark said: "Who would think that a hijacked ship could pass through one of the most policed and concentrated waters in the world?...

We Swedes wish to honor: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Cole_bombing http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darrell_S._Cole True Swedes - like I - love America. Yes, we are Europeans and you are Americans. Often, we insult each other, by employing various methods. Yet, you are our sisters'N'brothers and nothing will ever change tHAT. I would give my life up for America. The US is a nation which believes in true freedom. This idea will conquer the world.

The shipwreck was filmed by a remote-controlled submarine A near-intact shipwreck apparently dating from the 17th century has been found in the Baltic Sea, Swedish television has said.The discovery was made during filming for an under-water documentary series. Public service SVT television said the wreck could be from the same era as the famous Vasa warship, which sank on its maiden voyage in August 1628. The broadcaster said the Baltic's low oxygen content and low temperature had helped preserve the wreck. SVT said the origins of the ship were unclear but its features resembled the work of Dutch ship-builders...

ESTONIA WILL NOT ALLOW THE NORD STREAM PIPELINE ON ITS SEABED By Vladimir Socor Thursday, September 27, 2007 Estonia's government has turned down the Russo-German company Nord Stream's request to survey the seabed off the Estonian coast. The survey was to precede the construction of the Russian gas pipeline on the Baltic seabed to Germany for Gazprom. The Estonian coalition government took the decision unanimously on September 21. It has met with general understanding in the European Union and in German editorial pages since then, contrary to previous attempts by interested German circles to portray this Gazprom-led project as a...

TALLINN, Estonia (AP) — Estonia decided Thursday it will not allow a German-Russian consortium to conduct a survey of its exclusive economic zone in the Baltic Sea for a planned underwater gas pipeline. The survey was necessary for a possible rerouting of the 750-mile pipeline that will deliver natural gas from Russia to Germany under the Baltic Sea. "Each coastal country has full sovereignty and a right to make decision involving its own waters," Foreign Minister Urmas Paet said in a news conference. "Furthermore, we think the Baltic Sea is not a proper place for such a pipeline." Estonia's refusal...

NATO holds largest naval exercise in Baltic Sea Sunday 13th May, 2007 Stockholm, May 13 (Xinhua) NATO's has begun its largest naval exercise in the Baltic Sea in the waters off Sweden's southern port city of Gothenburg. The exercise, which kicked off Saturday, involves around 10,000 troops and 80 warships from 17 countries including the US, Britain and France. It will last until May 24. The manoeuvre is aimed at improving NATO troops' ability to handle crises in inshore waters and to reach the scene quickly when terrorist attacks occur. NATO holds similar military exercises annually. As a member of...

Heaven and Hel Is Hel nicer than Magaluf? Can Odessa outparty Ibiza? As eastern Europeans flock to the Med, Tim Bryan goes beachcombing in the opposite direction Saturday July 15, 2006 The Guardian They are signs of the times. Across eastern Europe, the travel agents offer cheap self-catering holidays from Mallorca to Corfu. Rich Russians and Ukrainians are now sojourning on the Med, Czechs and Poles sunbathing in Greece or Cyprus, and the Baltic peoples head anywhere south, and hot. But where did they used to go? And is there anyone left in these former workers' playgrounds? More pertinently, can...

<p>The former German chancellor Gerhard Schroeder will be the chairman of the supervisory board of the pipeline-syndicate NEGP Company, said the boss of the Russian corporate group GAZPROM Alexej Miller during a celebration for the start of construction of the new pipeline through the Balic Sea in Babajewo.</p>

This month, Russia lost two jet fighters during military exercises that simulated a major war with NATO. A naval task force was deployed in the North Atlantic on a mission to intercept and destroy U.S. reinforcements heading to the European theater of war. During exercises on Sept. 5, a Su-33 jet fighter fell off the flight deck of the aircraft carrier Admiral Kuznetsov during landing and sank. The pilot ejected and was rescued. Then on Thursday, seven Air Force jet fighters were sent from the St. Petersburg area to fly over the neutral waters of the Baltic Sea to Kaliningrad....

The winter is harsh even by Russian standards The record low temperatures in Russia over the last few days are continuing to bite as government services struggle to fix breakdowns at heating facilities. Some 25,000 people in north-western Russia are still struggling without heating, as temperatures dropped to -45C and old or overused heating systems broke down in the extreme conditions. The Emergency Situations Ministry said more than 1,000 employees were working on restoring heat to all affected regions, but officials complained about the lack of cash to carry out the major repair work needed. There are also reports that...