Asylum seekers use World Cup tickets as visa-free way into Europe

‘People will seize any chance … to seek asylum. They know there are places that will take you in humanely’

PROSPECTIVE asylum seekers have bought World Cup tickets to get into Russia without a visa in order to try to cross into Eu-member Finland.

YLE, the Finnish state broadcaster, reported a citizen of a third country admitted he had bought World Cup match tickets and applied for a Fan ID to try to reach Finland with the intention of seeking asylum.

Required for entry to matches, the Fan ID for ticketholders replaces the visa that is usually required to enter Russia.

A Nigerian man was detained on the same day trying to enter Finland with a fake Brazilian passport, and three young Moroccans were caught on Sunday trying to cross the border through the forest north of St Petersburg. All four are seeking asylum.

Last week, this reporter saw a curlyhaired man detained in the Russian border city of Svetogorsk. The man’s taxi driver said he was a Moroccan who had entered Russia with a Fan ID.

FSB agents confirmed the man was a Moroccan citizen and said he would be charged with trying to illegally cross the border and deported. They said they were paying “heightened attention” to the border during the World Cup.

The Russian publication Fontanka reported that at least 10 people had been detained trying to cross the Finnish border during the tournament. Marko Saareks, of the Finnish border service, told YLE: “It was a little surprising that there were so many incidents right at the start of the World Cup. We assumed that there would be more nearer to the end, when countries start to be knocked out of the competition.”

The Russia-finland route is cheaper and safer for those seeking asylum than paying smugglers to cross the Mediterranean on an overcrowded boat.

Those detained for illegally crossing the Finnish border can also not be deported while their asylum application is being considered.

Svetlana Gannushkina, a migrantrights activist, said visa-free entry with a World Cup Fan ID could spark a new wave of refugees. “People will seize any chance to use their right to seek asylum. They know there are places that will take you in humanely,” she said.

Russia briefly became popular as a route to the EU in 2014, when refugees discovered a loophole allowing people on bicycles to cross the Arctic border to Norway without documents. Many refugees fleeing the war in Syria travelled to the tiny mining town of Nikel before pedalling across the border on cheap bicycles, often in sub-zero temperatures.