Finland suspects a Russian vessel violated the country's territorial waters on July 26, the Finnish Defense Ministry said in a statement. The ministry said the border guard is investigating the incident, which it said took place in the eastern Gulf of Finland. The border guard's chief investigator said the ship was a seabed exploration vessel operating under the Russian Navy's Baltic Sea fleet. Petter Stauffer told Finland's Helsingin Sanomat newspaper that the ship was escorted out of the area by a Finnish border guard vessel and that the incident lasted around 7 minutes. Relations between Finland and Russia have soured since the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, which prompted Helsinki to join NATO.
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