(Helsinki Times) A task force at the Ministry of Justice is recommending that the anti-terrorism legislation be amended by criminalising the performance of tasks crucial for the criminal activities of terrorist organisations, writes Helsingin Sanomat. Public incitement to terrorism should similarly be […]
(Yle) Some 80 girls in Finland reported having undergone female genital mutilation (FGM), according to a school health survey by the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare, THL. The agency’s 2019 school health survey asked over 35,000 girls in upper secondary and […]
(Helsinki Times) Officials at the Ministry for Foreign Affairs have confirmed that three Finnish mothers and nine children returned yesterday to Finland from al-Hawl, a detention camp set up for the women and children of the so-called Islamic State in Syria. The […]
(Yle) An Iraqi man who was refused asylum in Finland and believed to have been murdered a month after returning to his home country may still in fact be alive, police said on Wednesday, as they launched an investigation on charges of […]
(News Now Finland) The Finnish Security and Intelligence Service Supo published its new year book on Thursday, painting a picture of the threats facing Finland from domestic extremist movements, cyber espionage and terror attacks. Supo says the threat of terrorism in Finland […]
(Yle) Finland’s Prosecutor General Raija Toiviainen wants to bring charges against Finns Party MP Juha Mäenpää for inciting hatred against an ethnic group. As Mäenpää delivered a speech before the legislature last June, he likened asylum seekers to an invasive species. According […]
(Yle) Speaking on Yle’s talk show Ykkösaamu on Saturday, Prime Minister Sanna Marin said she was very pleased with the government’s decision to repatriate Finnish children from the al-Hol refugee camp. “It’s up to ministry officials to determine whether Finland will also […]
(Yle) Two Finnish children from the al-Hol refugee camp are in the care of Finnish authorities and en route to Finland on Saturday evening, the Foreign Ministry’s Under Secretary of State Pekka Puustinen said at a press conference on Saturday just after […]
(Yle) The Foreign Ministry announced on Thursday that Finland is preparing to evacuate two Finnish children from the al-Hol refugee camp in Syria, where relatives of Isis combatants are being held. The ministry said that to protect the children’s privacy and ensure […]
(Yle) Minister for Foreign Affairs Pekka Haavisto received the support of 110 MPs in a confidence vote held in Parliament on Wednesday concerning the repatriation of Finns living in the al-Hol camp in Syria. Out of 200 MPs, 79 MPs voted against […]
(Yle) Opposition and government MPs clashed during a tense parliamentary debate over the government’s position on repatriating Finnish citizens currently at the al-Hol refugee camp in Syria on Tuesday afternoon. An opposition interpellation tabled last week set its sight on putting the […]
(Yle) Finnish women should not be repatriated from the camp, because they are a security risk. That’s the reasoning of those opposed to bringing back Finnish citizens in the al-Hol camp in northern Syria, which holds refugees from the war in Syria […]
(Yle) The Foreign Ministry took the lead in planning an operation to repatriate Finnish nationals who wanted to return to Finland from the al-Hol refugee camp in Syria, according to official documents seen by Yle. The material indicated that the draft plan […]
(Yle) The Finnish Immigration Service (Migri) says it will revisit about 500 asylum decisions following a European court ruling critical of a previous deportation. Last week the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) found Finnish authorities guilty of violating the European Convention […]
(Yle) Finland will pause asylum seeker repatriations to Iraq following criticism by the European Court of Human Rights. Police tweeted the news on Saturday, saying that the suspension does not cover convicted criminals. Interior Minister Maria Ohisalo immediately took to Twitter, saying […]
(Yle) Finland has been found guilty of violating Articles 2 and 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights in the case of Ali, an Iraqi man who was denied asylum in 2017, deported to Iraq and killed a few weeks later. […]
(Yle) An Oulu court has slapped Finns Party lawmaker Sebastian Tynkkynen with a 50-day fine after convicting him on charges of ethnic agitation. The total fine amounts to slightly more than 4,000 euros. The conviction came over texts and images Tynkkynen posted […]
(Yle) The trial of Finns Party MP Sebastian Tynkkynen began on Thursday in the Oulu District Court. A lawmaker from the northwest municipality where the proceedings are being held, Tynkkynen is suspected of agitation against an ethnic group in a 2016 Facebook […]
(Yle) Several public as well as private swimming pools in Finland are taking measures to encourage immigrants, particularly women, to learn how to swim. The Finnish Swimming Teaching and Lifesaving Federation, an organisation dedicated to improving swimming skills and reducing drowning deaths […]
(Yle) Kirsi Pimiä, the non-discrimination ombudsman, has recommended that Finland’s public swimming pools should permit the use of burkinis, the body-covering bathing suits sometimes used by Muslim women. Pimiä said she became aware of cases of burkini-wearing women having been turned away […]
(Yle) The Finnish government is still to decide on the fate of Finnish women and their children detained at a refugee camp in a Kurdish region in Syria. A dozen or so Finnish women who followed their husbands as the men joined […]
(Yle) The city of Helsinki has announced a programme to help schools and children’s NGOs better recognise situations where planned trips by migrant-background families might endanger children’s safety. According to a report by tabloid daily Ilta-Sanomat, the guidelines will advise adults working […]
(Yle) Three civil servants with Helsinki City’s Urban Environment Division face labour discrimination and dereliction of duty charges in Helsinki District Court after failing to finalise an employment contract with a new hire after he said he was a practicing Muslim and […]
(Yle) A citizens’ initiative on creating a law to specifically ban the practice of female genital mutilation (FGM) in Finland is headed to the new Parliament for consideration by MPs. The initiative garnered a total of 61,266 signatures by the beginning of […]
(Yle) Following news about alleged antisemitic, homophobic and racist Facebook comments made by Social Democrat MP Hussein al-Taee, al-Taee admitted in his blog on Monday that they were authentic and he was the author. Previously, he had questioned whether they were written […]
(Jerusalem Post) The newly elected Finnish MP Hussein al-Taee of the Social Democratic Party of Finland (SDP) is facing a wave of criticism this week for comparing Israel to the Islamic State, antisemitic rants against Jews and pro-Iranian regime advocacy. The Finnish-Kurdish […]
(Yle) Fledgling politician Hussein al-Taee, who was recently elected to parliament on a Social Democratic Party ticket, has come under intense scrutiny over old Facebook posts about the situation in the Middle East. Among other things, the new MP from Vantaa appeared […]
(AFP) Jussi Halla-aho, who led his nationalist Finns Party to more than double its seats in parliament in Finland’s election, is a former medieval language lecturer turned hardline MEP and vehement critic of immigration and Islam. Less than six months ago, the […]
(Yle) A man who left Finland to join the terrorist group Isis was the son-in-law and business partner of the imam of the Oulu-based Islamic Society of Northern Finland, Yle’s investigative journalism programme MOT reported on Monday. As part of a programme […]
(Yle) A journalist writing on Twitter on Wednesday said that he had encountered a Finnish woman living in an area in Syria controlled by the extremist organisation Islamic State. Kurdish affairs analyst and journalist Mutlu Civiroglu tweeted that the woman came to […]
(Yle) There are currently as many as 3,000 girls in Finland who face the risk of being subjected to female genital mutilation or FGM, according to an analysis released by the National Institute for Health and Welfare on Friday. The THL data […]
(Yle) Finland has started tallying births by circumcised mothers as the medical community is increasingly dealing with delivery complications caused by female genital mutilation, FGM. Päivi Polo, who heads the women’s clinic at Turku University Hospital, told Yle she sees 1-2 circumcised […]
(Yle) The Finnish Security Intelligence Service (Supo) warns that more than 200 convicts jailed for terrorism crimes will be freed from Western European prisons within the next few years. “While in prison, these people may not necessarily have changed the way they […]
(Yle) A citizens’ initiative demanding that lawmakers draw up a specific law to outlaw FGM in Finland has attracted over 50,000 signatures. This means it has met the threshold enacted in a 2012 Finnish law, and the Finnish Parliament must now put […]
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