Committee backs extending Finland’s border security law
Friday 16th October 2026 on 12:30 in
Finland
Finland’s Constitutional Law Committee has backed extending the border security law through the end of 2028, saying it can be enacted as an exception to the Constitution, Yle reported. The Left Alliance and the Greens filed dissenting opinions.
The law allows authorities to prevent people seeking to enter Finland from crossing the border or to remove them from the country. It took effect in 2024, and its validity has already been extended once, by a year. The proposed extension would add two years, bringing the law’s total duration to four and a half years.
The committee said there was no obstacle to extending the law, but that the need for it must be justified. Committee chair Heikki Vestman of the National Coalition Party said Finland’s security environment remained serious and difficult to predict.
During consultation on the proposal, Chancellor of Justice Tuomas Pöysti said the government’s reasons for extending the law were limited. The proposal says the threat of instrumentalised migration at the eastern border remains high and that the security situation requires the law to stay in force.
The Chancellor of Justice said the necessity and proportionality of the temporary exception law should be assessed in light of its overall duration and the fact that the powers it provides have never been used. He also questioned whether waiting two years for the next review could count as regular assessment, given changes in the security situation and the law.
The committee said the government must monitor developments in both security and the legal situation and respond with legislation if necessary.
Left Alliance MP Johannes Yrttiaho said the law violated Finland’s fundamental rights system, constitutional order and international human rights obligations. He said the reasons for extending it until the end of 2028 were not sufficiently detailed and that the extension would bind Parliament well beyond the next election.
Green MP Krista Mikkonen said Finland had the right and duty to protect its borders and national security, but argued that responses to Russia’s actions must not violate absolute human rights.