We cannot let it wither On patrol at the EU's most easterly Russian border

On patrol at the EU's most easterly Russian border

- Miranda Bryant

Among the serene lakes, thick forest and summer houses of North Karelia's border zone, the line between Finland and Russia is almost invisible. Walking along the border path in Meriinaho, part of the Finnish border guard station of Ilomantsi, we are closer to St Petersburg than to Helsinki. This is the most easterly point of the continental European Union.

Every now and then a pair of striped fibreglass posts pop up from the blueberry patches on either side of the frontier. One is painted blue and white for Finland, the other green and red for Russia.

Despite generations of tensions and several wars, until recently these bollards - plus Finnish and Russian border guards - were deemed sufficient. But the mood on both sides of the 830-mile frontier, now also a critical Nato border, is changing fast.

Last week as he sat down at the White House with Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Donald Trump for talks on how to end the war in Ukraine, Finland's president, Alexander Stubb, drew on the border to convey to the US president Europe's collective concern.

He told the US president: "We might come from a small country but we have a long border with Russia, over 800 miles. And we of course have our own historical experience with Russia, from world war two, the winter war and the war of continuation."

He added: "We found a solution in 1944 and I'm sure that we will be able to find a solution in 2025."

But that solution remains elusive. And in this corner of Europe the threat from the Kremlin is taken increasingly seriously.

After his election last year, Stubb used his first trip as president to visit the border in North Karelia and to assert that "all measures must be taken" to keep the whole country inhabited. "We cannot afford to allow eastern Finland, northern Finland or any region in Finland to wither away," he said.