Norwegian Soldiers patrol the border with Russia in 2022. Norway recently announced it was mulling the construction of a border wall to deter the type of state-sponsored illegal migration that prompted Finland to close its border with Russia and begin building a wall. AFP/GETTY IMAGES
THE WATCH STAFF
Norway may follow its Nordic neighbor Finland in constructing a fence along its 198-kilometer border with Russia, the country’s justice minister told Norway’s public broadcaster in late September 2024. A border wall is one of several measures being contemplated by the NATO member to strengthen its security, The Associated Press reported.
Justice Minister Emilie Enger Mehl told public broadcaster NRK that one of the many benefits offered by a border wall is to increase domain awareness. “A border fence is very interesting, not only because it can act as a deterrent but also because it contains sensors and technology that allow you to detect if people are moving close to the border,” Mehl said. Norway also is considering adding border staff and increasing monitoring, she said, according to AP.
Finland closed its land border with Russia — Europe’s longest at 1,340 kilometers — in late 2023 after repeated border crossings by large groups of illegal migrants who had been transported to the border by Russian border agents, Finnish authorities said. Norway’s Storskog border station, the only official border crossing between Norway and Russia, wants to avoid that kind of “hybrid warfare,” as the Finns have characterized it.
Finland’s decision to close its border came after more than 1,300 third-country migrants without proper documentation or visas — an unusually high number — entered the country in three months, just months after the nation became a member of NATO. Russian President Vladimir Putin has publicly said Finland would pay a price for joining the transatlantic treaty organization. Helsinki is building a 200-kilometer border fence in separate sections along its border with Russia, which makes up NATO’s northern flank. Finnish officials say the fences, equipped with state-of-the-art surveillance equipment, will be able to better monitor border threats.
Should the security situation worsen, the Norwegian government is ready to close the border on short notice, said Mehl, who visited neighboring Finland recently to learn about how the 1,340-kilometer Finland-Russia land border was closed. Mehl, supported by Ellen Katrina Haetta, the police chief in Norway’s northern Finnmark county, said a similar fence may serve Norway well. “It’s a measure that may become relevant on all or part of the border,” she said.
In 2015, about 5,000 migrants and asylum-seekers crossed from Russia into Norway via Storskog, straining border resources. The next year, a 200-meter-long and 3.5-meter-high fence was built around the border station to increase security and safety. Norway, a country of nearly 6 million people, has long welcomed asylum seekers and refugees but sees the recent activity on the Russian border much like the Finns: an orchestrated action designed to destabilize the country’s internal politics. Like most of its Nordic neighbors, Norway had maintained cordial relations with Russia until it invaded Ukraine in 2022. Since then, the relationship has soured. Most recently, Oslo decided to reduce the number of staff at the Russian Embassy.