Vice Chancellor of Justice of Finland rejected tightening restrictions on the border with the Russian Federation

Vice-Chancellor of Justice of Finland Mikko Puumalainen rejected the initiative of the country’s Cabinet to tighten restrictions on the border with Russia. The TV and radio channel reports this Yle citing a source in Puumalainen’s office.

According to a media source, this decision by Puumalainen was justified by the fact that the initiative of the Finnish Cabinet of Ministers “would not make it possible to submit applications for asylum.”

Also, the office in the office of the Chancellor of Justice of Finland stated that Mikko Puumalainen assessed the presented project of the Ministry of Internal Affairs from the point of view of legality and came to the conclusion that there are no legal prerequisites for further preparation of the decision proposed by the department. The documents do not contain sufficient guarantees that “the decision will preserve a genuine and effective opportunity to apply for international protection enshrined in the Finnish Constitution, EU laws, the European Convention on Human Rights and other human rights documents,” the media concluded.

On November 14, it became known about the intention of the Finnish Ministry of Internal Affairs to limit the operation of checkpoints on the Russian border. The head of the department, Marie Rantanen, explained this decision by the “large influx” of refugees from Syria, Somalia, and Yemen. In turn, the official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry Maria Zakharova called such accusations from Helsinki disinformation and emphasized that they have no basis.

On November 16, Finland decided to close four checkpoints on the Russian border: Vaalimaa (Torfyanovka), Nuijamaa (Brusnichnoe), Imatra (Svetogorsk) in the Leningrad region and Niirala (Vyartsilya) in Karelia . The restrictions came into effect at midnight on November 18th.