Satellite images show that over the past month Russia has withdrawn more than 100 units of heavy equipment from the border with Finland - this coincided with the start of Helsinki's move into the North Atlantic Alliance. This is stated in the publication of the Finnish newspaper Yle.

The withdrawal of equipment was recorded in the military unit 34667, located in the village of Alakurtti in the Murmansk region, 70 kilometers from the border with Finland. The unit is part of the Russian Northern Fleet, the newest Russian military district.

The 80th Independent Motorized Rifle Brigade consisting of 2100 servicemen serves in the military unit in Alakurtti. Back at the beginning of May, the Finnish media reported that there was no evidence of mass participation of the brigade's servicemen in the war in Ukraine.

But satellite images taken on May 13 and 24 show that the military unit has significantly reduced the number of military equipment. They record, in particular, the withdrawal of MT-LB tanks and tractors - up to a hundred units in total, as well as, probably, Gvozdika self-propelled artillery units.

Military expert Mark Eklund estimates that up to 800 servicemen could have left the military unit in Alakurtti together with the equipment. He assumes that Russia decided to transfer them to Ukraine to participate in the war.

Eklund considers it unlikely that the military were taken off Alakurtti to conduct exercises, because they start every six months and were supposed to end just in the spring.

The fact that the military were sent to the war in Ukraine can be indirectly suggested by the fifty job ads in Alakurtti that Yle journalists found on the Internet. Most are related to rear jobs, such as lawyers, but there are also more than two dozen job openings for gunfighters.