Finland's enforcement department has halted new seizures of Russian state assets in the country following a Wednesday ruling by the Helsinki Court of Appeal, the Finnish newspaper Helsingin Sanomat reported.
The appellate court's decision concerns claims worth billions brought by the Ukrainian state gas company Naftogaz in connection with a dispute over the Crimean peninsula on the northern coast of the Black Sea.
Naftogaz is Ukraine's national oil and gas company, headquartered in Kyiv, where it oversees natural gas extraction, transport and supply. Helsingin Sanomat is the largest daily newspaper in Finland, a European Union member state in northern Europe that shares a long eastern land border with Russia. Within the Finnish justice system, the enforcement department carries out court orders and property freezes, while the Helsinki Court of Appeal hears challenges to legal and enforcement decisions in the capital.
Previous seizures of Russian property in Finland
While new enforcement actions have been suspended, previous asset freezes remain in place. Finnish authorities had been seizing Russian state property since August 2024, carrying out around 44 million in seizures that continue to remain in force.
Those measures were triggered by a lawsuit filed by six Ukrainian energy companies seeking to attach Russian Federation property abroad. Among the assets placed under freeze in Finland was the Russian Centre of Science and Culture, an institution in Helsinki established to promote Russian language, culture and academic ties overseas.
Confiscation of European Union border programme funds
The latest court ruling follows an earlier move in June, when Finnish authorities confiscated Russian assets worth around 4 million euros.
According to the Finnish public broadcaster Yle, Russia had transferred 3.7 million euros to Finnish authorities under a European Union border cooperation programme. Yle, officially known as Yleisradio, is Finland's national publicly funded broadcasting company and operates television, radio and online news services across the country.
European Union border cooperation programmes were joint regional initiatives designed to fund local development, infrastructure and environmental projects across the frontier between European Union member states and neighbouring countries.
Russia transferred the 3.7 million euros to Finland before the start of military hostilities in Ukraine. The joint programme was shut down after the hostilities began, and the transferred money remained on the balance sheet of the Finnish authorities.
