The project will also include an access road which will run the entire length of the Narva River, a little under 80 kilometers in length, to enable Police and Border Guard Board (PPA) personnel to rapidly access areas which were previously hard-to-reach and sometimes swampy.

The development follows a border violation last fall, when Russian border guard personnel entered Estonian territory at Vasknarva.

The Narva River border surveillance systems including drone countermeasures and patrol roads are due for completion in 2027 and are set to cost around a third of the total €180 million eastern border construction project.

As things stand, border guard personnel can observe around 70 percent of activity on the Narva River, which marks the northeastern border between Estonia and the Russian Federation.

The new radar systems will address this in gaining surveillance access to previously concealed sections of the river, which has been illegally crossed for smuggling purposes as well as being a national security issue. The new radars will also grant enhanced surveillance capabilities when it comes to activity in the air.

"The border guard has been able to patrol the river by boat, but everything from the riverbank to the nearest major road has been something of a blind spot. We are reducing all of those blind spots and, in any case, improving surveillance capability," Interior Minister Igor Taro (Eesti 200) told "Aktuaalne kaamera".

Of the 14 radar towers to be constructed along the riverside, from its mouth in the Gulf of Finland to Peipsi järv (Lake Peipus), its source, one will be erected in the Puhatu bog area, around 30 kilometers from Narva.

While radars are good for getting an overview, responding rapidly to a border violation requires other measures: For this reason, a patrol road running alongside the entire length of river will be constructed too.

The anti-drone measures will also constitute a "unique solution" to the threat, said Veiko Kommusaar, PPA deputy director general. "There are various surveillance solutions and various countermeasure solutions, but as far as combining surveillance and countermeasures into a single system that responds to threats, no such solution is known to exist."

The PPA is also thinking about making the road accessible to local residents too.
"If someone has a summer cottage nearby, then with certain exceptions from the point of view of a local resident, I believe it is possible to make accommodations in these matters," Kommusaar added.

Last December, three Russian border guards crossed the Estonian-Russian border in eastern Estonia by hovercraft. The incident happened near the Vasknarva breakwater, which starts on the far bank of the Narva River in Russian territory, extending into Estonian territory.

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