On Thursday (April 4), the Finnish Ministry of the Interior said the country's border crossings with neighboring Russia will remain closed.

The move comes after the government in February ordered the closure of the border until April 14. As of April 4, this measure has now been extended until further notice.

In addition, the sea crossings on the island of Haapasaari, in the port of Nuijamaa and on the island of Santio will be closed to "leisure boating" from April 15. Finland wants to prevent the threat of targeted migration from Russia in the spring by closing the harbors to maritime traffic.

In the press release, the government said that irregular migration into Finland from Russia "could expand to maritime traffic" during spring. "This would be dangerous to people seeking to enter Finland and would burden maritime search and rescue," the government claims.

The indefinite closure means that migrants will still not be able to apply for asylum at the border crossings -- with the exception of "other border crossing points for maritime traffic and at border crossing points for air traffic," a corresponding press release reads.

Read more: Migrants evade tight controls to cross Russian-Finnish border

'Instrumentalized migration' expected to increase

According to the press release, the Finnish government expects the "instrumentalized migration" from Russia to continue and increase. This would pose a "serious threat to Finland's national security and public order," the press release reads.

"Finnish authorities see this as a long-term situation. We have not seen anything this spring that would lead us to conclude that the situation has changed meaningfully," Finland's Minister of the Interior Mari Rantanen is quoted in the press release. "In addition, spring will provide opportunities to put more pressure on Finland. There are hundreds and possibly thousands of people close to Finland's border on the Russian side that could be instrumentalized against Finland."

Finland, which shares a more than 1,300-kilometer-long border with Russia, began gradually closing the frontier crossings in November.

Despite both being external borders for the EU and NATO following Finland's inclusion in the military alliance a year ago, the Finnish-Russian border runs mostly through taiga forests and does not follow any rivers.

Rights groups including the Council of Europe have been raising concerns over the rights of refugees, asylum seekers and migrants amid the border closures with Russia.

The Finnish authorities, meanwhile, accuse Moscow of deliberately bringing undocumented asylum seekers to the posts in order to cause problems for the EU and NATO country. The Kremlin denies this.

There were no immediate reactions to Finland's move by the Kremlin in Moscow.

Read more: Asylum seekers arrested after crossing border to Finland

with dpa