Published on
The risk of drones drifting into Finland as a result of the ongoing war in Ukraine is rising, the head of the country’s military intelligence service told the AFP news agency.
Major General Pekka Turunen, chief of Finnish Defence Intelligence (FDI), was speaking ahead of the release of a Finnish military intelligence report on Thursday that updates the security situation in the country that shares a 1,340-kilometre border with Russia.
One concern highlighted in the report was the risk of long-range drones drifting into Finland.
“The risk of a drone drifting into Finnish airspace or onto Finnish territory is growing all the time, the more Ukraine strikes in this area near the Gulf of Finland,” Turunen said.
“Ukraine has been targeting these oil ports…quite close to Finland and now we know how Russia is countering them by using GPS jamming, so if a drone was using GPS for navigation to reach its target, it could be diverted somewhere else through this jamming.”
There had not been any incidents reported so far, he said.
Finland’s security situation has deteriorated since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine began in 2022, but the intelligence agency noted that the situation had remained largely unchanged compared to a year ago.
“The military threat has not increased,” he said.
In the wake of the invasion of Ukraine, the Nordic country ended decades of military non-alignment and applied to join NATO, becoming a member in April 2023.
The political turmoil following US President Donald Trump’s push to seize Greenland was likely encouraging Russia to act “more freely,” as focus shifted away from Ukraine, he said.
Trump announced at Davos on Wednesday that he was scrapping tariffs against European countries who sided with Denmark and ruled out military action to seize Greenland.
“At least on a political level, it has probably had an encouraging effect on Russia,” he said.
“In other words, Russia sees this political climate as a sign that the West, NATO, and Europe are in disarray, on the brink of collapse.”
Trump had earlier threatened European nations with tariffs for opposing his plans to acquire Greenland, angering Brussels and putting the NATO military alliance under unprecedented strain.
High alert
Europe as a whole is on high alert after drone flyovers into NATO airspace reached an unprecedented scale last September, prompting European leaders to agree to develop a “drone wall” along their borders to better detect, track and intercept drones violating Europe’s airspace.
In November, NATO military officials said a new US anti-drone system had been deployed to the alliance’s eastern flank.
And following a violation of Polish airspace, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte announced the formation of the Eastern Sentry programme, which aims to deter further Russian incursions.
Some European officials described the incidents as Moscow testing NATO’s response, which raised questions about how prepared the alliance is against potential threats from Russia.
The Kremlin has dismissed allegations that Russia is behind some of the unidentified drone flights in Europe as “unfounded.”
Additional sources • AP, AFP