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Finland has accused Russia of pushing asylum seekers to its eastern border, which Russia denies.

The European Union’s border protection agency, Frontex, is set to deploy 50 officers to Finland after an increase in asylum seeker arrivals at its eastern border with Russia.

Frontex said on Thursday that in addition to border guard officers and other staff, the agency would send equipment such as patrol cars “to bolster Finland’s border control activities”.

The reinforcement is expected to be on the ground “as soon as next week”, it said in a statement.

Finland on Wednesday said it would shut all but its northernmost border crossing with Russia after it recorded an increase in arrivals of undocumented migrants.

Helsinki said Moscow was to blame, with Finnish Prime Minister Petteri Orpo accusing the Russian authorities of “a systematic and organised action” of facilitating the entry of the migrants.

“Undoubtedly Russia is instrumentalising migrants” as part of its “hybrid warfare” against Finland, Foreign Minister Elina Valtonen said on Wednesday.

Finland joined NATO in April after decades of military non-alignment and pragmatic friendly relations with Moscow. Its 1,300-kilometre (800-mile) border with Russia serves as the EU’s external border and makes up NATO’s northeastern flank.

Moscow has denied it is funnelling desperate asylum seekers to the Finnish border.

More than 600 asylum seekers have entered Finland via Russia in November, compared with only a few dozen in September and October.

They were mostly from countries including Yemen, Afghanistan, Kenya, Morocco, Pakistan, Somalia and Syria, according to border officials. Most were young men in their 20s, but some were families with children, border guard data and photos from news outlets showed.

Stopping short of naming Russia, Frontex head Hans Leijtens said in a statement that the agency was bolstering support to Finland as it was facing “hybrid challenges”.

“This collaboration shows that when facing complex border issues, Europe stands united, offering support through tangible actions,” Leijtens added.

Frontex currently has 10 officers working at the borders of Finland.

In 2021, 3,000 to 4,000 asylum seekers became stranded in a no-man’s land on the border between Poland and Belarus as Warsaw deployed security forces to stop people from entering amid freezing winter temperatures.

Lithuania and Latvia also reported sharp increases in the number of people trying to cross their borders at the time.

The EU and Warsaw said Minsk was deliberately enticing migrants and refugees to Belarus and then pushing them westwards with promises of easy entry into the bloc, and accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of masterminding the crisis.

When Mahtowin Monro thinks back to the Thanksgivings of her childhood, she remembers the pageants.

It was an elementary school tradition to divide the class in two, with some children dressed as Pilgrims — in bonnets and tall hats — and others assigned to represent Indigenous peoples, with paper feathers and headbands.

Together, they were meant to act out the holiday myth: that early settlers in the United States embraced their newfound Indigenous neighbours with open arms and a hearty feast.

But even as a child, Monro could sense that depiction was wrong. Now, she helps lead a ceremony meant to honour the real history of Indigenous peoples in North America — a history she believes Thanksgiving plays a part in erasing.

On the fourth Thursday of November, timed to the US Thanksgiving holiday, she and other members of the group United American Indians of New England (UAINE) gather in Plymouth, Massachusetts, to hold a National Day of Mourning.

The event is part protest, part remembrance, part spiritual ceremony. It not only acknowledges the ongoing violence against Indigenous people but also brings together speakers on a range of issues, from environmental destruction to fishing rights.

Monro, who identifies as Oglala Sioux, attended her first National Day of Mourning in the mid-1980s and said she was instantly hooked.

“It was, to me, so amazing,” Monro said. “I really liked the idea that there were Native people in New England — some of whom had been told growing up that they were extinct — that were there speaking about their history and what was going on with them now.”

It was at the ceremony that she met the late Indigenous leader Wamsutta Frank James, who would eventually be the grandfather to her twin children.

An Aquinnah Wampanoag man, James was among the founders of the National Day of Mourning in 1970.

At the time, he had been invited to speak at the 350th anniversary of the Pilgrims’ arrival to Plymouth — but event organisers revoked the offer after screening his remarks, which referenced the atrocities committed against Indigenous peoples.

“Our lands have fallen into the hands of the aggressor. We have allowed the white man to keep us on our knees,” Frank wrote in his suppressed speech.

“What has happened cannot be changed, but today we must work towards a more humane America, a more Indian America, where men and nature once again are important.”

Rejected from the anniversary event, Frank instead organised a protest on Cole’s Hill, overlooking Plymouth Bay — a tradition Monro and her daughter Kisha James carry on to this day.

Monro spoke to Al Jazeera about her memories of Frank and why reimagining holidays can be a tool for empowerment.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Al Jazeera: Why do you think that they approached Wamsutta to speak? And what were they expecting him to say?

Mahtowin Monro: Well, he was very well known in the area as the head of the Federated Eastern Indian League. He was quite prominent. And I think there was this idea that he was going to come and praise the Pilgrims.

They thought that he would come and say, “Oh, we’re so grateful that the Pilgrims came, and we all got along, and everything has been great.”

He wrote his speech along with his wife. I want to give her credit. It wasn’t just him. But he very carefully used Pilgrim sources such as Mourt’s Relation and other things they had written. He certainly couldn’t go and praise the Pilgrims, but he also felt it was important to tell the truth about what had happened.

Thanksgiving was not a happy time for him or other Wampanoag people because it represents a celebration of the invasion and all the devastation that would follow for Indigenous people in the region. So he was very clear about that.

By today’s standards, his suppressed speech is actually pretty tame. People now would say things even more forcefully, but the state wanted to see his remarks in advance. And when he sent them, they said, “Oh no, you can’t go and give that.”

Al Jazeera: How do you think that the rejection of the speech shaped him as a person and as a leader?

Monro: Certainly he was not going to go give a speech that would be palatable to these state officials. He was not going to give a speech in praise of the Pilgrims and all the good that they had supposedly done for Indigenous peoples, when that was completely counter to any historical reality.

He had been somebody whose family had suffered a lot of discrimination. I’ll give you an example. He was, we believe, the first Native man to graduate from the New England Conservatory of Music. He was an incredibly talented musician, a trumpet player.

When he got to the end of his courses at the New England Conservatory, he was told by his primary teacher, who cared about him very much: “You’re the best trumpet player in this class, but no symphony orchestra in the country will hire you because of the colour of your skin.”

And that was true because he was dark-skinned. At the time, all the orchestras in the country were all white, right? So, given all his talent, he couldn’t get a job.

He experienced tremendous discrimination in his life, as did his family. All his siblings, all of them would talk about how they had to run faster and study harder and do everything better to try to overcome all the prejudice that they dealt with.

I think that’s why he felt strongly — well before 1970 — that it was important for Indigenous people in the region to be united and to work together to assert themselves as Indigenous people and to demand respect from the white people.

Al Jazeera: You and your daughter Kisha are very much keeping his legacy alive and keeping this ceremony alive. How did he inspire you? How did he shape your work today?

Monro: I learned everything about the Day of Mourning from him — how to do things and what the traditions were, that sort of thing. I spent many hours talking to him about that, to understand them more fully.

I didn’t at the time know that I would end up being a leader in the organization, but certainly it led to that. And he was very supportive. He also felt that it would be important to have more women out front. To be honest, although women had always done a lot of the work, they weren’t necessarily out front as speakers or leaders within the organization.

What I learned from him is to just keep doing this, because it’s really important to do this kind of educational work and speak truth to power and tell the truth about our history.

Al Jazeera: There’s this larger push to question holidays like Thanksgiving and Columbus Day and, in some cases, reimagine those holidays entirely. Why is it important to interrogate holidays and question the history that they celebrate?

Monro: Our organization obviously does more in the year than just organising the National Day of Mourning. One of the things that we do is we do work on Indigenous Peoples’ Day campaigns — that is, campaigns to abolish Columbus Day and celebrate Indigenous Peoples’ Day instead.

We’ve been doing that for several years now. In Massachusetts, for instance, we have managed to get resolutions passed in at least 30 towns. But we’re also trying to get it passed on a statewide basis.

The celebration of [European explorer Christopher] Columbus is really harmful. It gives us the idea that Native people were these passive people, just waiting for Columbus to arrive — just waiting to be discovered — when, in fact, they had many, many different cultures and were perfectly successful on their own.

But it continues to be presented that Columbus and all the Europeans who came somehow brought civilisation to us. All of this is really damaging. It is damaging if you’re a kid and you’re Native. You know, Columbus was a genocidal maniac. We don’t hide that from our kids.

It is damaging not just to our kids but any kid to learn nonsense like that. It’s the worst kind of settler colonial nonsense. It erases us and presents their version of history as the only true history. So these things are really embedded throughout American culture, and it’s really important to resist that and to call it out.

Al Jazeera: Have you ever heard any pushback about the National Day of Mourning? And how do you address misconceptions or concerns that you hear?

Monro: Well, we address them individually, or sometimes we don’t address them at all.

There are people who absolutely resist any truth-telling. They don’t want to hear about the genocide of Indigenous people. They want to have this very pretty George-Washington-and-cherry-pie kind of history that doesn’t tell the truth.

So we’re not going to change their minds and really don’t waste our time fighting with them. But there are a lot of other people: settlers who’ve grown up with all this mythology, with all this nonsense. When they start to find out the truth, they’re actually pretty mad that they were lied to for so long.

So I think it’s really important for non-Native people to experience being with Native people and listening to us and getting a better understanding. They don’t understand whose land they are on. And believe me, we make that clear.

Two migrants have died in the English Channel after trying to reach the UK from France.

A man and a woman, both believed to be in their 30s, were found lifeless at around 1.30pm on Wednesday near Boulogne-Sur-Mer, the local prosecutor told Le Monde.

They were among 60 people found on board a dinghy that had got into distress.

Several of the group had fallen into the sea and were suffering from hypothermia when they were brought to shore for treatment.

But medics were unable to save the two people found unresponsive.

They are the seventh and eighth migrants to die at sea off the French coast so far this year.

The six others – all from Afghanistan and aged between 21 and 34 – lost their lives on 12 August.

Reports of the newest deaths come ahead of the two-year anniversary of the single greatest loss of life in the Channel in recent history when 27 migrants drowned on 24 November 2021.

At least 27,708 people have crossed to the UK aboard small boats so far this year, according to government data compiled and analysed by Sky News.

This is 34% lower than at the same time in 2022, when 42,206 people had succeeded in making the dangerous journey.

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Despite the overall number of people making the life-threatening trip in 2023 being lower than last year, the number of people being packed aboard each boat has increased – a sign that smugglers are seeking to make more profit, at the expense of safety.

An average of almost 49 people have been found on board each boat that made it to the UK so far this year. It was 41 per boat last year and just 13 in 2020.

On Thursday, revised official figures showed that net migration to the UK in 2022 was at a record high of 745,000.

Police in Dublin are dealing with a “serious incident” after a stabbing involving several children outside a school in the city centre.

Police said five people including three young children, a man and a woman have been taken to hospitals in the Dublin region.

One of the children, a girl, and the woman are being treated for serious injuries.

The other two children and the man are being treated for less serious injuries, according to police.

Police are currently at the scene on Parnell Square East and are being assisted by other emergency services.

“Five casualties have been taken to various hospitals in the Dublin region,” an Irish police spokesperson said.

“The casualties include an adult male, an adult female and three young children.

“One child, a girl, has sustained serious injuries, the other two children are being treated for less serious injuries.

“An Garda Siochana is in contact with parents of all three injured children.”

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Thirteen women and children hostages held by militants in Gaza will be the first to be released – as the the temporary truce in Gaza between Israel and Hamas begins at 7am on Friday, Qatar has said.

Dr Majed Al Ansari, spokesperson for Qatar’s foreign ministry, said it had received a list of the civilians to be freed at 4pm tomorrow and families would be given priority.

He said it was expected Israel would release Palestinian prisoners in return.

“We are hoping that we don’t see any further delays,” he said.

“I think we have reached a point now where everything is in place, we are ready to go on the ground.”

The deal, agreed following talks mediated by Qatar, Egypt and the US, will include the Red Cross visiting the hostages and bringing medicines to them.

It would also mean hundreds of trucks carrying humanitarian, medical and fuel supplies would be allowed to enter Gaza, while Israel would halt all air missions over southern Gaza and maintain a daily six-hour daytime no-fly window in the north.

Dr Al Ansari said humanitarian aid would start flowing into Gaza as soon as the truce begins, adding it was “a fraction” of what it needs.

The ceasefire had been set to take effect at 10am local time on Thursday (8am UK time).

The structured agreement was reached and confirmed on Wednesday morning, but more than a day later an expected announcement of the official start time had yet to materialise.

Asked about the delay by reporters at a news conference in Doha, Dr Al Ansari said discussions had been “very difficult and detailed”.

“We wanted to make sure that nothing would cause harm in the process of getting the hostages out, and the perimeters of the agreement are agreed upon in the operational sense, on both sides,” he said.

He added the temporary truce includes a comprehensive ceasefire in both north and southern Gaza – and it was hoped it will lead to a permanent truce.

Hamas has agreed to free 50 Israeli women and child hostages held by militants in Gaza, in exchange for Israel releasing 150 Palestinian women and children from Israeli jails.

Israel has said the truce could last beyond the initial four days as long as the militants free at least 10 hostages per day.

A Palestinian source has told the Reuters news agency a second wave of releases could see as many as 100 hostages freed by the end of the month.

Both sides have said they will go back to fighting once the truce is over.

Hamas and other militant groups, including Palestinian Islamic Jihad, captured more than 240 hostages when Islamist gunmen rampaged through southern Israeli towns on 7 October, killing around 1,200 people, mostly civilians.

In retaliation, Israel has been bombarding the enclave for weeks as it bids to “wipe out” Hamas. At least 13,000 Palestinians have been killed in the strikes on Gaza, including at least 5,500 children, according to the Hamas-run government.

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