Photographer: Sefa Karacan/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images Customers compare the size of the iPhone 6 Plus and the iPhone 5s Russians, who for years endured some of the highest prices forApple Inc. (AAPL)’s iPhone, can buy the latest model for less than what shoppers pay elsewhere inEurope. Russians have often been found in queues outside Apple stores in London and Frankfurt during product debuts. Now, thanks to the ruble’s decline in recent months, iPhone prices in Russiaare the lowest in Europe when measured in dollars or euros, according to Russian handset retailer Svyaznoy. In ruble terms the sticker price hasn’t changed. An iPhone 6 without a carrier contract starts at 31,990 rubles ($700), relatively high for many Russians. However, after the ruble’s 25 percent slide against the dollar and 18 percent drop against the euro in the past four months, the Russian price has dropped below that of other countries. In neighboring Finland, long a popular destination for Russian iPhone shoppers, the iPhone 6 costs local shoppers about 700 euros ($870). “Gray-market imports have been a serious competition factor for our stores in St. Petersburg, where people could travel just 100 kilometers across the Finnish border and buy anything ranging from clothes to gadgets,” said Lyudmila Semushina, a spokeswoman for the re:Store chain, an official Apple reseller in Russia. “Now, it probably makes sense to smuggle suitcases of iPhones in the opposite direction.” Russian prices still don’t beat the U.S., where the iPhone 6 without a carrier contract starts at about $650 before taxes. bloomberg