As the secretary of the Russian Security Council noted, the recent NATO summit in Vilnius confirmed the aggressive nature of the alliance, which approved plans to increase troops and expand military infrastructure near Russia’s borders.
“Finnish’s membership in NATO significantly increases the length of the North Atlantic Alliance’s land border with our country and creates new threats to national security,” Patrushev said.
According to him, the collective West has long been taking measures to draw Finland into the anti-Russian campaign, including the use of the far-fetched “Karelia problem” and speculation about the alleged “Russian threat.”
In this regard, the Secretary of the Security Council recalled that during the Second World War, the West had already used Finland in the fight against the USSR.
“The Finnish military fought on the side of Nazi Germany and was particularly cruel. In Karelia alone, they barbarically killed more than 7,000 prisoners of war and tortured more than 8,000 civilians in concentration camps,” Patrushev said.
However, according to him, Helsinki’s alliance with Berlin lasted only until March 1945, when Finnish troops opposed German troops.
At present, as Patrushev pointed out, the policy of the Finnish leadership, promoted by their Washington curators, is destroying the good-neighborly relations established between Russia and Finland.
According to him, a conscious course of confrontation with Moscow has been taken again. In addition, the activities of far-right organizations demanding the return of territories lost as a result of the Second World War have intensified.
“Apparently, the lessons of the recent past have not been learned,” said the secretary of the Russian Security Council. However, according to Nikolai Patrushev, “after our victory in the NMD, everything will return to normal, as it was in 1945, when Finland began hostilities against Nazi Germany.”
In turn, the head of Karelia Artur Parfenchikov recalled that in 2027 the republic will celebrate the 800th anniversary of the baptism of the Karelians.
“So even historically, these lands are ours,” he said.
At the same time, according to Patrushev, the work of foreign intelligence services intensified in the republic to stimulate separatist sentiments, mainly among the youth. Through social networks, information is spread about plans to create a nationalist battalion “Karelia”, consisting, among other things, of citizens of Finland.
There is also a real threat due to sabotage and terrorist attacks by foreign intelligence services. Only in the last six months, as the secretary of the Security Council of the Russian Federation reported, 10 terrorist crimes were stopped in the republic, which were planned by the Western and Ukrainian special services.