– Before I went to bed, I saw unusual and moving lights on the river. It may well be that they were already looking for him then, says Svein Derås. The defector Andrej Medvedev passed the house of the married couple, who live in the hamlet of Skrøytnes, barely two kilometers west of the Norwegian-Russian border in Pasvikdalen in Sør-Varanger. The Russian defector has explained that he got help from people in Murmansk to get to Nikel, close to the Norwegian-Russian border. Svein Derås points towards a wooded area between Swan Lake and the couple’s home. The Norwegian-Russian border runs through this water. – He came up through the birch field you see over there. He then walked between the round bales and the barn, before continuing out onto the road, he says. And continues: – We have started to lock the door now. Asking for information It was midnight before Anna Derås went to bed for the night of Friday. – Then I heard the sound of a scooter. In retrospect, I thought that it was the police who were here, or that it was the border guards who were looking for him, she says. – We who live along the border should actually get some information about how we should act if someone crosses the border, says Anna Derås. Photo: Gunnar Sætra / news – You are getting a lot of attention because of this case. What do you think about it? – I don’t think it’s that pleasant. Those of us who live along the border should actually be given some information on how to act if someone crosses the border, says Anna Derås. Andrej Medvedev was arrested at 01:58 on Friday by a border patrol and the police. In a video published by the website Gulagu, he tells a dramatic story about how he allegedly got to Norway. He says that he must have had help from people in Murmansk to get to the town of Nikkel, one mile from the border with Norway. The photo will show Medvedev’s Russian passport. Escaped in a dressing gown From there he is said to have started his escape wearing a white dressing gown. He is said to have climbed over the barbed wire fence on the Russian side and ran across the frozen Pasvikelva. Andrej Medvedev was arrested by police and a border patrol from the Norwegian Armed Forces at 01:58 on Friday night. Russian websites claim that the man should have had a leadership role in the Wagner group, a detachment of mercenaries fighting on the Russian side in Ukraine. Photo: TELEGRAM/GULAGU.NET Medvedev claims he was persecuted. He says he saw headlights and heard dogs behind him. Shots should also have been fired at him, claims the Russian defector. – We haven’t heard any shots, and we didn’t know anything about this until the following day, says Svein Derås. Medvedev will be questioned by the PST this week. news has asked the Finnmark police district about the alleged shooting incident. Sølve Solheim, Finnmark police district. Photo: Knut-Sverre Horn / news – The police are investigating all aspects of the incident and his explanation. The case is still under investigation, says Sølve Solheim, operations manager for border control. – We do not yet know whether a shot has been fired, but nothing has come to light so far to indicate that shots have been fired across the border. Since late summer last year, three illegal border crossings between Russia and Norway have been registered. In the last twenty years, there has been an average of one passage every two years.
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The Russian defector Andrej Medvedev got past the house of Anna and Svein – news Troms and Finnmark
