Starting Friday evening, Finland will again shut its borders with Russia, this time for one month, the Finnish government said. The move comes the same day Finland reopened two of its eight land border checkpoints with Russia.
The Finnish government backtracked on its decision to reopen two of its eight border crossings with Russia on Thursday, announcing late in the day that the crossings will be shut again on Friday evening, just one day after they were reopened.
The announcement is presumably a direct reaction to reports that more than 200 asylum seekers entered Finland from neighboring Russia after the Scandinavian country reopened two crossings on Thursday (December 14), Reuters reports, citing information from the Finnish border agency.
"If the phenomenon continues, we will close these border crossings," Prime Minister Petteri Orpo said before the two crossings were reopened on Thursday.
According to the border guard, some 900 asylum seekers from nations such as Kenya, Morocco, Pakistan, Somalia, Syria and Yemen entered Finland from Russia in November, an increase from less than one per day previously.
Finland-Russia tensions
The Finnish government in Helsinki has been accusing the Russian government of orchestrating the arrival of asylum seekers at the border crossings in retaliation for Finland's decision to increase defense cooperation with the United States. The Kremlin in Moscow denies this. Russia's latest actions have been compared to those undertaken by Belarus at the Polish and Baltic states' borders last summer.
The arrivals stopped following Finland's closure of its entire border with Russia on November 30, but resumed on Thursday when the two crossings were opened.
The closure will be effective through January 14, the border guard said in its statement.
On Friday, the Kremlin said a planned defense pact between Finland and the United States will lead to tensions between Helsinki and Moscow.
Concerns raised over migrant rights
Following Finland's temporary total border closure with Russia, the Council of Europe on Monday raised concerns over the rights of refugees, asylum seekers and migrants.
"It is crucial that Council of Europe member states, even when dealing with challenging situations at their borders, react in a manner that fully aligns with their human rights obligations," the Council's Commissioner for Human Rights, Dunja Mijatovic, wrote in a letter addressed to Finland's Minister of Interior, Mari Rantanen.
The letter was part of an ongoing dialogue between the Council and Finland's government following their decision to gradually restrict access at the border due to fears Russia was trying to use migrants as pawns in a "hybrid warfare" scheme.
The Finnish Non-Discrimination Ombudsman had already raised similar concerns. The earlier decision to close all but one of the eastern land border crossing points "already seriously jeopardizes the right to seek asylum," he said. The UN's High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi also expressed similar concerns, noted Mijatovic.
"Applying for international protection is concentrated to open border crossing points for air and water traffic" now that migrants can no longer claim asylum at the land border stations, the border guard statement reads.
From Belarus to Russian-Finnish border
Minister of Interior Mari Rantanen, who represents the anti-immigration Finns Party, told Reuters on Monday there was no cause for human rights concerns, however, as asylum could be sought at other entry points.
Despite both being external borders for the EU and NATO following Finland's inclusion in the military alliance in April, the Finnish-Russian border runs mostly through taiga forests and does not follow any rivers.
Over the weekend, reports emerged that some migrants on the Russian side might be being recruited for Russia's war with Ukraine.
with Reuters