, ;, or , , or ) is a hill in Lapland at the boundary between Finland, Norway, and Russia. It is the second northernmost international

tripoint A triple border, tripoint, trijunction, triple point, or tri-border area is a geography, geographical point at which the boundaries of three countries or Administrative division, subnational entities meet. There are 175 international tripoints ...

in the world; the tripoint of Finland, Norway and Sweden is further to the north. The Finnish side belongs to the Inari Municipality, the Norwegian side belongs to

Sør-Varanger Municipality Sør-Varanger (; ; ) is a List of municipalities of Norway, municipality in Finnmark Counties of Norway, county, Norway. The administrative centre of the municipality is the town of Kirkenes. Other settlements in the municipality include the vill ...

, and the Russian side belongs to Nikel Municipality. The peak is located in Norway. The Sami name (''muotke'', ''myetki'') refers to an isthmus between waters.

Tripoint cairn

Treriksrøysa Treriksrøysa () is a cairn which marks the tripoint where the borders between Norway, Finland, and Russia meet. The site is on a hill called Muotkavaara, in the Pasvikdalen valley, west of the Pasvikelva river and southwest of Nyrud just we ...

, a rock

cairn A cairn is a human-made pile (or stack) of stones raised for a purpose, usually as a marker or as a burial mound. The word ''cairn'' comes from the (plural ). Cairns have been and are used for a broad variety of purposes. In prehistory, t ...

at the

was erected in 1846. A

concrete Concrete is a composite material composed of aggregate bound together with a fluid cement that cures to a solid over time. It is the second-most-used substance (after water), the most–widely used building material, and the most-manufactur ...

tetrahedron In geometry, a tetrahedron (: tetrahedra or tetrahedrons), also known as a triangular pyramid, is a polyhedron composed of four triangular Face (geometry), faces, six straight Edge (geometry), edges, and four vertex (geometry), vertices. The tet ...

was added on the top in 1945. The border of Norway and Russia was demarcated in 1826, while Finland was an autonomous part of Russia. Furthermore in 1833, it was ruled that the border between

Grand Duchy of Finland The Grand Duchy of Finland was the predecessor state of modern Finland. It existed from 1809 to 1917 as an Autonomous region, autonomous state within the Russian Empire. Originating in the 16th century as a titular grand duchy held by the Monarc ...

and

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

proper meets the Norwegian border at "Mutkavaara" (Muotkavaara). Between 1920 and 1944, when Petsamo was part of Finland, there was no tripoint, since Norway and Russia did not share a border. Muotkavaara became a tripoint again in 1944, when Finland ceded Petsamo to the

Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

in the

Moscow Armistice The Moscow Armistice was signed between Finland on one side and the Soviet Union and United Kingdom on the other side on 19 September 1944, ending the Continuation War. The Armistice restored the Moscow Peace Treaty of 1940, with a number of modi ...

. The border was further modified in 1947 when Finland sold the Jäniskoski area to the Soviet Union. Since then the border between Finland and Soviet Union (now Russia) is oriented to the south-west from the Muotkavaara tripoint. In fact, because this place across 3 different countries with 3 different time zones,(Norway uses UTC+1, Finland uses UTC +2 and Russia uses UTC+3 in that area), so it is also known for its time zone tripoint (the time zone tripoint only works in the winter when it’s freezing in that place, because Finland and Russia both uses UTC +3 at summer, while Norway uses UTC+2). The tripoint is most easily reached from Grensefoss on the Norwegian side, around a hike each way.

Outdooring

The Norwegian side of Muotkavaara is part of

Øvre Pasvik National Park Øvre Pasvik National Park (, , ) is located in the southeastern part of the Pasvikdalen valley in southern Sør-Varanger Municipality in Finnmark county, Norway. Covering an area of , the national park is dominated by Siberian-like taiga consis ...

. The Finnish side is slightly outside the Vätsäri Wilderness Area. There is a joint name for the contiguous natural reserve area: Pasvik–Inari Trilateral Park. ()

References

{{coord, 69, 03.44, N, 28, 55.41, E, type:mountain_scale:40000_region:FI, display=title Finland–Norway border Finland–Russia border Norway–Russia border Border tripoints Sør-Varanger