Finland Border Guard reports business as usual despite aborted Russian coup
While the situation has calmed down in Russia, Finland’s Border Guard is closely monitoring any developments.
The Finnish Border Guard ramped up surveillance in the wake of an attempted coup in Russia on Saturday.
Yevgeny Prigozhin, head of the private military corporation Wagner, threatened to overthrow the Russian military leadership on Friday, but the mutiny was over in about 24 hours.
On Saturday night, the Wagner boss announced that his troops were turning back and ordered an end to the advance towards Moscow.
According to Lieutenant Colonel Jukka Lukkari, Deputy Commander of the Southeast Finland Border Guard, his units had an ordinary weekend, despite the upheaval.
“We intensified our monitoring of the situation and observed traffic and the surrounding area. That is what we are doing, monitoring what is happening at the border. I can’t go into details, but we are monitoring the situation at the border more closely and the border traffic at the border crossing points,” Lukkari told Yle.
Lukkari said that the situation will continue to be monitored.
“It seems that there were no specific observations over the weekend either. Of course we are constantly vigilant, but especially during the weekend we were particularly attentive in following the situation,” Lukkari added.
Border traffic calm
If the situation escalated and, for example, there were many more people than usual trying to cross the border, the Border Guard’s own personnel would be the first to be deployed.
“In the first instance, border security incidents are a matter for the border authorities. It should be a much different situation that the Defence Forces intervene, as they are responsible for defence preparedness,” Lukkari clarified.
According to Lukkari, border traffic was relatively normal at border crossing points in Southeast Finland during Midsummer.
“The events in Russia did not noticeably affect border crossing traffic. Of course, Midsummer increased border traffic slightly, as is always the case with holidays,” Lukkari told Yle.
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