Russian state TV sends ominous warning to NATO nation

Russia will “start focusing” on Finland because the northern European country has closed several border crossings between the two countries, Russian state television host Sergei Mardan has warned.

Mardan said on his show: Mardan livethat Finland was “very important” to “St. Petersburg elites” and accused the nation of erecting a new Iron Curtain, according to an English translation posted onformerly Twitter, by an advisor to the Minister of the Interior of Ukraine, Anton Gerashchenko.

Finland is a member of the European Union and joined the NATO military alliance in April. The move angered Russia and led to a Kremlin statement aimed at “strengthening military capabilities.”

Tensions further escalated after Finland closed four crossing points on its border with Russia on Saturday.

The Vaalimaa, Nuijamaa, Imatra and Niirala crossings in southeastern Finland were all closed by Finnish border guards after Helsinki accused Russia of deliberately sending undocumented illegal migrants to the crossing points. passage in retaliation for the country’s membership in the NATO alliance.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told a regular news briefing that the claims were false. He told the press: “This only causes deep regret because we have had very good relations with Finland for a long time, pragmatic, based on mutual respect.

“And of course we regret that these relations have been replaced by such an exclusively Russophobic position, which the leaders of this country have begun to adopt.”

In his message to X, Gerashchenko said that Russian officials had deliberately started the problem.

He wrote: “Russia is creating this situation not so much to obviously worsen its relations with Finland and create problems for it, but to recreate the Iron Curtain for its own citizens. The Putin regime wants to bring back the situation of the USSR and the Cold War. “.

Mardan also told state television that “the closed border is, in fact, the Iron Curtain.” He added: “That tells you better than anything else what kind of life we ​​have entered into… For the elites of St. Petersburg, Finland is a big problem. It is precisely from now on, I suppose , that Russia will begin to focus. “

The TV host is known for his controversial views and previously compared being Ukrainian to swearing an oath to the devil.

In October the Mardan livehe said, having Ukrainian citizenship is a “political choice” and “completely deliberate.”

“It’s just a ritual,” Mardan said. “It’s like swearing an oath to the devil. You denounce Christ and say, ‘Now I’m Ukrainian.'”