Colonel Matti Pitkäniitty has been working for the Finnish border guard for a quarter of a century, but he has never experienced anything quite like the rapidly escalating events of the last fortnight.
There are similarities, certainly, with the migration crisis of 2015 and 2016, when about 1,700 people traversed Finland’s remote northern border crossings. But, for the head of the border guard’s international affairs unit, the tensions that have heightened in recent weeks between Helsinki and Moscow have resulted in a situation that is unique.
With Moscow accused of waging “hybrid warfare” on its neighbour and driving refugees and migrants to the border area, the Finnish government abruptly announced on Tuesday that it would close the entire 830-mile land border between the two countries for two weeks.
Pitkäniitty said Russia had become a “transit country” for migration and accused Moscow of using asylum seekers for its own political purposes. “To use people as tools who come from environments like this, that is a cruel, cruel way of handling human beings,” he told the Guardian.
“And I have to say that when you look at the weather conditions at the moment in Lapland, it was -25 C [last] week. And then you put people bicycling there.”
Over the last two weeks, asylum seekers from countries including Somalia, Syria, Yemen and Iraq have braved snow, Arctic temperatures and two-hour days to reach Finland – many arriving on bicycles and in clothing ill-equipped to cope with the extreme cold.
However, from midnight on Wednesday, those following in their footsteps will no longer be able to apply for asylum in Finnish Lapland or anywhere on the land border. Amid an increasingly acrimonious row, the last remaining open crossing – the most northerly – will be closed.
The Finnish guard first started noticing a change in approach by Russian authorities at the border at the beginning of August, when they started to get small numbers of people arriving without the required documents to enter the visa-free Schengen zone. Over the last two weeks the numbers have risen steeply, and so far this month more than 900 people have crossed into Finland from Russia.
“If we would go with this pace that we had [last] week, we would end up with 10,000 to 15,000 in a year,” said Pitkäniitty.
Many of the people arriving have done so by bicycle, a way for the people smugglers who have facilitated the asylum seekers’ journey across Russia to avoid detection at the border.
Smugglers are understood to sell bikes to asylum seekers at inflated prices as part of their passage from St Petersburg. By road, the total journey from the Russian city to the most northerly border crossing at Raja-Jooseppi is more than 1,400km (870 miles).
“Russian authorities are saying that they cannot prevent anyone to exit Russia if they have valid travel documents to Russia. However, from the Finnish perspective Russia has become a transit country for illegal migration,” said Pitkäniitty.
This has made relations between the two neighbours – between whom tensions have been growing since Finland became a Nato member in April – “extremely difficult”, he said.
Before the closure of Raja-Jooseppi was announced, the border guard had been preparing for increased numbers at the last remaining crossing, despite its remote location and limited facilities.
“If you look at the map, and see where Raja-Jooseppi is and what kind of environment that is, from my perspective it’s not a logical place to have a migration situation on a European scale,” said Pitkäniitty.
There are also multiple layers to what is happening at the border, he added, which is what makes the situation so difficult. “Russia is saying something with sending migrants and Finland is saying something with closing the border. And then we have another layer where we talk about migration and rights of people who would seek international asylum.”
All asylum seekers will, he insisted, have their applications looked at “carefully, independently and separately”.
However, the UN and refugee advocacy groups fear it could prevent people from seeking asylum and warn that the border’s entire closure could contravene international law. During the closure, asylum seekers will instead be directed to airports and ports.
Annu Lehtinen, the executive director of the Finnish Refugee Council, is concerned for the safety of those making the journey to northern Finland in such difficult winter conditions. “It’s very, very cold at the moment, so we are looking at very harsh weather conditions and arriving people who are not sufficiently equipped for this type of weather,” she said.
When it is open, the primary route for asylum seekers to enter Finland is via the land border, she said, as just 500 people were allowed to enter this year under the UNHCR resettlement programme. From their countries of origin, asylum seekers are helped by smuggling gangs who she said are using social media posts in Arabic to encourage movement towards Finland. “Information is moving very quickly about the Finnish border situation,” she said.
Finland’s non-discrimination ombudsman has criticised the government’s border crossing closures, saying it could seriously endanger the fundamental right to seek asylum.
Annika Sandlund, the UNHCR representative to the Nordic and Baltic countries, said the agency was following the situation “very closely” and are in direct contact with Finnish authorities.
“Complete closure of the border where asylum seekers would be prevented from seeking asylum would be contrary to international law,” she said.
