The Consul General of Finland in St. Petersburg commented to on the secretly filmed meeting with the Russian opposition in St. Petersburg
16:06•Updated 16:10
Consul General of the Consulate General of Finland in St. Petersburg Sannamaaria Vanamon a meeting with representatives of the Russian opposition was intercepted and recently shared in the Russian media.
The video has been published, among other things LenTVZ4 (you switch to another service) On the Telegram channel, and Moskovski Komsomolets (switch to another service) magazine made a story about it. He was the first to write about it in Finland Ilta-Sanomat (you switch to another service).
The video shows how Vanamo met a representative of the Russian opposition party Jabloko in a restaurant Alexander Shishlov and Boris Vishnevsky. Russian media claim that they discussed financial support for the Russian opposition.
Sannamaaria Vanamo confirmed the authenticity of the video to . He emphasized that dialogue with parliamentarians and representatives of civil society is part of the normal activities of diplomatic missions.
– The background of the meeting with the Jabloko party’s St. Petersburg city councilor Aleksander Shishlov was e.g. his previous work as human rights commissioner in St. Petersburg. At the meeting, current topics were widely discussed, e.g. About the travel restrictions of Finland and the EU, the consul general said.
According to him, the filming situation did not come as a surprise.
– Filming situations like this have come before me and other Western colleagues before.
Vanamo denies the Russian media’s claim that money was discussed at the meeting.
– Contrary to what is claimed in the Moskovski Komsomolets article, Finland’s financial support for Russian social actors was not on display at the meeting, he summarized.
Filming with a hidden camera is a common practice in the Russian media. Often this method is used, for example, against opposition figures.