STOCKHOLM, October 24. /TASS/. Sweden has spent €2.2 million and one week on an effort to look for a phantom foreign submarine only to eventually acknowledge the absence of suspicious “foreign underwater activity.” For seven days the Swedish armed forces were conducting a sweeping operation involving naval ships and the Marines to find nothing alarming. As follows from the armed forces’ news release, all units have been restored to the routine degree of readiness.

Sweden has failed to present any proof of unauthorized foreign presence in its territorial waters.

“The operation failed to confirm the type, nationality of form of operation by a foreign country,” the search operation’s commander, Rear Admiral Anders Grenstad, told a news conference on Friday. The operation has cost the treasury €2.2 million. The country’s fire-fighters spend as much during one week to deal with forest fires, Grenstad said.

He addressed vigilant locals with words of thanks for support.

“While the operation proceeded we got 250 e-mails and phone calls from individuals. The mass media were also helpful. As for the results of analysis, I will announce them late, when I know more about what exactly we can say,” he added.

Earlier, Swedish mass media claimed that a Russian submarine might have been responsible for the row. The daily Svenska Dagbladet even claimed the submarine was in distress.

In the meantime a Russian Defence Ministry official earlier said “the search for a Russian submarine is so unsuccessful because there is none.”

In the past Sweden was searching for a Soviet submarine in 1982 - in the Harsfjarden Bay of the Stockholm Archipelago. No submarines were found then but the defense budget went up.