Jussila was born in Varkaus. He was employed by the Ministry for Foreign Affairs for almost 40 years. His foreign places of residence were Marseille, San Francisco, Lagos, Ankara, Alger, Tunis and Prague. Jussila said during the Algerian civil war in 1994, half a year alone Chargé d'Affaires of the Embassy of Finland in Algiers on the functioning of the other embassy staff moved because of troubled conditions in Tunis. He was then acting Chargé d'Affaires in Tunis from 1995 to 1996.