Worried that the border could be closed "forever" after Moscow's order to mobilize for the war in Ukraine, an increasing number of Russians of military age fled via Finland to the Vaalimaa border crossing.
But the path will become even more complicated, after Helsinki's decision to close the border from midnight (21:00 GMT) to Russians with European tourist visas from the Schengen area.
“I just passed, I don't know how the others will do.
It's sad, sad,” Andrei Stepanov, a 49-year-old Russian, said of Finland's new restrictions.
Fear of mobilization
Asked about the case of the many Russians fleeing the mobilization, Finnish Interior Minister Krista Mikkonen spoke on Thursday of asylum requests assessed on a case-by-case basis.
For a week and the announcement of the "partial" mobilization by Vladimir Putin, the number of entries on the land border of 1,300 kilometers has practically doubled, even if the day of Wednesday was marked by a brake.
In recent days, the number of daily entries into Finland has been around 7-8,000, mostly at Vaalimaa, the southernmost post.
Its gray porticoes have become one of the places of transit for thousands of Russians heading for exile, as elsewhere in Georgia, Kazakhstan or Turkey.
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