“The Russian propaganda machine wants to create anxiety”

Following Finland’s accession to NATO, Moscow promised retaliatory measures. For several weeks, Helsinki has observed an unusual influx of undocumented migrants which led the authorities to close on Thursday November 30 its last border crossing still open with Russia, accused of using the migratory weapon against its neighbor.

“The phenomenon observed in recent weeks at the border must stop,” Prime Minister Petteri Orpo declared on Tuesday, noting that “the instrumentalized migration from Russia has continued.”

Helsinki closed four of its eight crossing points with Russia in mid-November, before restricting passage to a single border post, that of Raja-Jooseppi, the most northerly of the country, at the end of last week.

Since then, the number of migrants has fallen considerably. “In recent days there have only been a handful of arrivals. Yesterday (Wednesday) there were none,” said Annu Lehtinen, director of the Finnish Refugee Council, referring to a situation that However, it could still change in the coming days.

Asked about the care of migrants who would potentially be left in the cold in front of closed border posts, Petteri Orpo said he had “confidence in the judgment of the border guards and in their ability to respond to different situations”.

Russian visas and bicycles

According to the Finnish authorities, nearly 1,000 asylum seekers, notably from Somalia, Iraq and Yemen, have presented themselves since the beginning of August at the 1,340 kilometer-long border with Russia.

“I don’t know if this is very significant, but people often like to compare the Finnish situation with what happened between Poland and Belarus in 2021, when 30,000 migrants tried to cross the border. this year, Finland received 3,600, or 10% of this figure,” recalls Jussi Laine, professor at the University of Eastern Finland and specialist in border issues.

But for the Finnish government, it is the mechanism at work to destabilize the country that evokes the parallel, rather than the number of arrivals. According to Helsinki, Moscow has been trying to orchestrate a migration crisis for several months by transporting hundreds of people to their common border by bus or taxi, before they finish the journey by bike, braving temperatures which drop blithely to – 25°C at this time of year.

“There was a campaign in Arabic on social media claiming that the Finnish border is open. It is clear that smuggling networks are behind this communication operation. Then, Russia changed the way it operated, by granting visas and then facilitating the movement of people towards the border,” explains Annu Lehtinen.

Although the Raja-Jooseppi border crossing is difficult to access – it is located more than 1,400 km north of St. Petersburg, or an 18-hour drive – the government feared having to accommodate a growing number of migrants based on information collected by Finnish intelligence. Anticipating Russia’s recourse to migratory pressure, Finland began building a vast fence over 200 km at the end of February, but which has so far only been completed over three kilometers.

Rapid response from Helsinki

“The official discourse is to say that we had to act now, before the situation worsens. But above all, closing the border allows us to send a message to Russia to show it that Finland is capable of reacting quickly and take radical decisions”, analyzes Jussi Laine, recalling that the Finnish border is also that of the Schengen area, the EU and NATO.

Since Wednesday, Finnish border guards have been supported by around fifty officials from the European agency Frontex, responsible in particular for monitoring the vast uninhabited areas which make up most of the border.

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As early as last week, the Finnish government had considered closing its territory to arrivals from Russia, but the measure was then deemed disproportionate by the authority responsible for monitoring the legality of government measures. The border can be closed completely in exceptional circumstances, but this closure must be measured and asylum seekers must be able to submit their application.

According to the Ministry of the Interior, the Raja-Jooseppi border post should remain closed until December 13. In the meantime, asylum candidates will have to request protection “at border crossing points open for air and maritime traffic”, that is to say ports and airports, according to a government press release.

“There are no more flights or sea connections from Russia. In fact, it has therefore become impossible to enter Finland from this country to request asylum,” regrets Annu Lehtinen. “However, these migrants come from Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Somalia. These are nationalities which traditionally obtain asylum. The situation is clearly not in line with our international commitments.”

Estonia stands ready

If the closure of the border with Russia is officially motivated by reasons of internal security, the Finnish political landscape, marked by a strong push from the far right, is undoubtedly no stranger to this radical decision.

“The far right is much more present in the government than in the past, particularly with the True Finns party, whose anti-immigration agenda has existed for years. The decision to close the border is also linked to the political debate internal”, estimates Jussi Laine, according to whom Russia has managed to influence the debate and political decision-making in Finland using paltry means.

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“Today, everyone only talks about that. This is exactly what the Russian propaganda machine expects: to create a climate of anxiety, to make us panic and to make us deviate from our international commitments. But we must remain calm. The border guards are doing an excellent job and the situation is under control,” assures the expert on the Russian-Finnish border.

Faced with the complete closure of the Finnish border, other countries neighboring Russia are now worried about being targeted by similar influence operations. Estonia thus assured Wednesday that it was “ready” to close its border and to defend itself against “any hybrid attack” from Moscow.