Russian spies have been posing as fishermen and tourists in an attempt to carry out espionage in the Norway-Russia border region, a Norwegian military official has said.
Commander John Olav Fuglem, who heads the Finnmark Brigade of the Norwegian armed forces, said that the operatives had been found entering the northern port city of Kirkenes and that Russian espionage and hybrid warfare was increasing in the border region.
Fuglem told Swedish public sector broadcaster SVT: “We see a bigger threat up here and it is mainly espionage and gathering information.
“When you live here, you become a little more vigilant. And you quickly see if there are people with a different dialect who are walking around taking pictures, who are in places they should not be, or who are in places that are important to us. We notice that.”
Norway, like many other European countries, has ramped up security in its regions bordering Russia in the years following Moscow’s 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
The Finnmark Brigade was established in August last year as part of plans to double the strength of Norwegian defense capabilities near the Russian border by 2032.
Norway shares almost 200 kilometers (124 miles) of its land border with Russia in the Scandinavian country’s far north.
A Norwegian border guard cited by SVT said: “We have a lot to do here at the border and we have a good dialogue with those who live in the area. They are attentive to whether there is something that does not seem right.”
Both Sweden and Finland joined NATO as a direct response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, with Finland’s accession doubling the length of the military alliance’s land border with Russia.