Yesterday I started a three-day visit to Finland, Lithuania and Estonia. My mission is to see, hear and experience the Security and Defence pressures our European counterparts face.

 

Certainly the meetings yesterday in Helsinki reinforced the fact that the Russian threat to Europe extends far beyond Ukraine.

 

Ireland has a lot in common with Finland, having a similar population size and similar level of wealth. But its geographic location is totally different than ours.

 

With Finland having a 1,340-long border with Russia, placing it very much on the front line, I was delighted to have the opportunity to sit down with Finland’s Border Guard HQ in Helsinki.

 

That border has in recent times been the subject of instrumentalised migration, whereby the Russians had been transporting large numbers of asylum seekers directly to the Finnish border.

 

In response, Finland closed the border with Russia since late 2023.

Finland also recently legislated to grant powers to its Border Guard to deny international protection applicants the right to apply for asylum at the border. The law is intended to be used on a temporary basis to deal with a crisis. A similar approach was taken by Poland, Lithuania and Latvia in 2021 when they were faced with similar instrumentalised migration.

 

The 3,000 members of the Rajavartiolaitos - Gränsbevakningsväsendet - The Finnish Border Guard are working constantly against the threats through preparedness, smarter borders, use of technology and with advancing the new Eastern Border Fence project to better protect Finland, and the EU.

 

I also visited the Finnish National Cyber Security Centre to discuss the cyber threat. This is a key issue across the EU and the Irish Government has provided significant extra funding for our own National Cyber Security Centre.

 

I had a working lunch with my Finnish counterpart, Minister for European Affairs Joakim Strand . 

 

I also visited the The European Centre of Excellence for Countering Hybrid Threats , where I met the director Teija Tiilikainen. This centre opened in 2017 and last year Ireland formally became its 33rd member. I was briefed on the security of critical infrastructure, including subsea infrastructure, which is of particular concern for Ireland, and on countering disinformation campaigns.

 

I come away with a sense of just how serious the Russian threat is to the entire continent of Europe. The threat is so far not a military one outside of Ukraine, but Russia is aggressive in its use of hybrid warfare techniques, from cyber attacks to disinformation, and is doing all it can to destabilise Europe.

 

Ireland isn’t on the front line of this like Finland but we are by no means immune from the Russian threat. We need to learn from our European partners and act to ramp up our defences.