The European Union plans to build the first undersea internet cable directly linking Europe to Greenland, according to Ars Technica. The Pan-Arctic Cable could later extend to Canada and then to Japan and South Korea, bypassing the United States.

The European Commission named the cable a flagship project in an Arctic strategy paper published October 20. The paper backs "a sovereign, secure and resilient submarine cable connection linking Greenland directly to the EU." It says partners "like Canada" could help extend the cable toward Asia.

Ars Technica reports the project gained support after the US, Greenland and Denmark signed a security deal in September. The deal keeps Greenland a self-ruling part of Denmark but gives the US more military access. Ties between the US and its allies in Europe and Canada have grown strained over trade wars and the war in Ukraine.

Europe also wants new routes to Asia. More than 90 percent of data traffic between Europe and Asia runs through cables in the Red Sea, where fighting has made shipping riskier, Ars Technica reports, citing TeleGeography.

The EU has already put about 107 million euros into Greenland's connectivity and the cable plan. Reaching Asia will be hard. It would need more icebreakers to lay and fix cable in Arctic waters. An earlier Arctic project along Russia's coast was halted in 2021.

"We are going to see more cables that connect friendly countries," said Elisabeth Braw, a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council. The EU strategy also plans an Arctic Cable Hub to watch over and repair cables in the North Atlantic, after ships with ties to Russia and China damaged cables in the Baltic Sea.

What we know: The EU has named a Europe-to-Greenland undersea cable a flagship project in its new Arctic strategy.
What we don't: Only Ars Technica has reported this so far. NewsHabit hasn't seen independent confirmation.