Finland expels nine Russian “diplomats”

The Finnish government has decided to expel nine employees of the Russian embassy over intelligence activities.

Photo: screenshot from the video

This was reported by the government’s press service.

The decision to expel the Russians was made by the President of the Republic and the Ministerial Committee on Foreign and Security Policy. It is noted that their activities are incompatible with diplomatic status.

The Finnish government said that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs would inform the Russian ambassador about this.

This is not the first case of diplomatic confrontation between Moscow and Helsinki. Earlier, Russia was outraged by the “attack” on its consulate in Finland and then froze the accounts of Finnish diplomatic missions in the country.

On May 30, the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs summoned Finnish Ambassador Antti Helanterä and informed him that the Consular Section of the Embassy of the Russian Federation in Lappeenranta would close its office on July 1.

Also, on July 1, the offices of the Consulate General of Finland in St. Petersburg, Petrozavodsk, and Murmansk, which had been operating since the early 1990s, will cease to operate.

Last week the head of the negotiating group for the formation of the new government of Finland, Petteri Orpo, said that restrictions on entry for Russian tourists to the country will be extended.

As reported earlier, according to Antti Pelttari, the head of SUPO (the Finnish Security and Intelligence Service), the Russian intelligence officers were working under diplomatic cover, and their activities were complicated by the fact that Finland has restricted entry to the country for Russians.

It was also reported that at the request of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, law enforcement officers froze the land on which the Russian Center for Science and Culture in Helsinki is located, as well as the real estate owned by it.