Suspected illegal border crossing, person detained
Norway's military guards detained a person suspected of illegally walking over the Grense Jakobselv creek from Russia in the wilderness early Friday morning.
The police are unwilling to provide details, but say the arrest "happened without drama" at 09.20 am Friday morning.
Norway's border with Russia is guarded by military personell, but the rule is that if some crosses the border illegally, the person(s) will be handed over to the police.
Grense Jakobselv is the northernmost part of the land border between the two countries, about an hour's drive from Kirkenes where the suspect will now be questioned.
Asked by the Barents Observer if the person is Russian citizen or from another country, the police reported that more information will come later.
The FSB has not published any information about the allegedly illegal crossing. Regional media in Murmansk are quoting Norwegian media about the incident.
There have only been two known illegal border crossings in the Grense Jakobselv area in the course of the last decade.
A few years ago, a Russian man came onshore in the area where the creek meets the sea after his small boat drifted ashore from the Russian side of the coastal waters.
In November 2015, the autumn when 5,500 migrants were assisted to the official checkpoint at Storskog by the Russian FSB, a Chinese citizen suddenly came walking in the snow across the border near Grense Jakobselv. The man was not dressed for the snowy winter season.
The part of the border where the person was detained is about 20 kilometers from Pechenga, where the nearest Russian road goes. To reach Norway, illegals need to get through the barbed wire fence Russia has set up several kilometers from the actual border.
Extra surveillance
When Vladimir Putin in September 2022 announced partial mobilisation of soldiers to fight his war against Ukraine, Norwegian police made extra surveillance efforts to be prepared for deserters fleeing Russia. The Pechenga region is home to both the 61st Naval Infantry Brigade and the 200th Motorised Rifle Brigade.
Norway's land border with Russia is 198 kilometers long.
In 2023, two persons made it illegally in the terrain from Norway into Russia near the Storskog checkpoint.
After Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, there have also been a few other illegal border crossings in the Jarfjord and Pasvik areas, of which the former Wagner fighter Andrei Medvedev's crossing in mid-winter 2023 is most known.
