Kesällä 2023, kun Petteri Orvon porvarihallitus oli juuri nimitetty, tuli tuoreelle pääministerille täydellisenä yllätyksenä valtiovarainministeriksi nimitetyn perussuomalaisen ”riikan” räikeä rasismi.
Ensin yritettiin homma laittaa Purran nuoruuden piikkiin, mutta kun Orpo sai toimittajilta kuulla tuoreemmistakin rasistisia kirjoituksia, Orpo joutui toteamaan, että eihän tuollaista tekstiä voi ymmärtää tai sallia.
Omalla tahollaan ”riikka” sanoi tuolloin heinäkuisena maanantaina, että hän ei omia kirjoituksiaan anteeksi pyydä. Tiistaina hän pyysi kirjoituksiaan anteeksi. Keskiviikkona Orpo ja Purra pitivät Kesärannan pihamaalla tiedotustilaisuuden. Purra sanoi anteeksipyyntönsä olleen aito. Rasismi oli kylläkin vain sisäpiirin huumoria. Petteri sanoi, että Riikan anteeksipyyntö oli vilpitön ja nyt on kaikki kunnossa. Kaikki hallituspuolueet olivat myös allekirjoittaneet rasisminvastaisen julkilausuman.
Tässä välissä olemme v. 2024 nähneet hallituksen isolla rahalla teettämän ”rasisminvastainen kampanjan”, johon juuri kukaan ei lähtenyt mukaan. Eikä tietysti kannattanutkaan lähteä – kuinka kummassa kansalaisia saataisiin pois rasismin tieltä, kun heitä koko ajan hallituksen ministerit siellä taluttavat.
The great replacement [Islamization] spells the end of the welfare society, the end of Finnish society.
Riikka Purra, finance minister and chairperson of the Perussuomalaiset (PS)* party
Wednesday’s A-studio with PS Vice President Teemu Keskisarja, Pia Kauma of the National Coalition Party, and Sofia Virta of the Green League was an eye-opener, a stark reminder of the racist undercurrents flowing beneath Finnish society and how the media perpetuates the social ill.
Even if Keskisarja has received a dubious reputation for his vocal fear-mongering of Muslims, his hateful ideology is rooted deeply in PS and Finnish ideology.
“The feast will not improve by changing [replacing the ethnicity of] people,” he was quoted as saying in A-studio. “Rather, the opposite is true. Those who enable this replacement will turn [Finland] into a developing country of pig stys and bloodbaths. These are the reasons why the great replacement angers me and the Finns Party.”
And the icing on the cake, he said that migrants have already destoyerd the Finnish welfare state but have partly created a catastrophe.
PS Vice President Teemu Keskisarja.
While some blame the PS’s poor showing in recent elections and opinion polls, the truth is that what Keskisarja said is not only harmful to migrants trying to find work and a place in society, but the toothless pushback from Prime Minister Petteri Orpo’s government, which is set to take the country down a runious path to weaken labor laws and social security benefits.
Over and over again, the media overlooks the obvious about the Perussuomalaiset (PS)*: it’s anti-Muslim racism. Everything that the party does, its raison d’être, or reason for being, is anti-Muslim hatred. Certainly, not only are Muslims included in their attacks, but other minorities like blacks and people of color in general are.
Time and again, the media overlooks or sanitizes the party’s racism by overlooking the source of their hatred, which is xenophobia and Islamophobia.
The latest example was Prime Minister Petteri Orpo’s suggestion to bring some Palestinian children in Gaza to be treated at Finnish hospitals. The suggestion received a swift no from the PS.
“I wasn’t asked about it. And if I had been, I would have said I was against it [bringing Palestinian children],” Foreign Trade Minister Ville Tavio was quoted as saying in Helsingin Sanomat.
All of the elected 46 MPs (out of a total of 216) of the PS based their campaign on anti-Muslim and xenophobic themes. PS ministers like Finance Minister Riikka Purra, Interior Minister Mari Rantanen, former Economic Affairs Minister Wille Rydman, Justice Minister Leena Meri, Tavio, Speaker of Parliament Jussi Halla-aho, have all spread the great replacement theory with little to no consequences.
If their Islamophobia is a factor, and it is, why do most of the media and politicians turn a blind eye to such an offensive ideology?
If few will say it out loud, we at Migrant Tales will: The PS hates Muslims, and it shows.
During meetings July 31st to August 1st to observe the 50th Anniversary of the Helsinki Conference on Peace and Security I was glad to act as Finnish ngo host for Bruce Knotts, director of the NGO Committee of Disarmament, Peace and Security at the United Nations. He had an outspoken message to the convenors, the Finnish government about its arms trade with Israel:
“Sending of money and weapons to Israel should be stopped. Germany has just done this, and Finland and the USA should do the same.”
Adding:
” The current Israeli government does not want to end this war; they want to enhance it to take all of Gaza. They are also in the process using Israeli settlers removing and killing all Palestinians in the West Bank. The more radical members of the Israeli cabinet have been clear that they believe that God has given all this land to the Jews of Israel. Not only is Israel killing Palestinians, but they have also attacked without provocation Iran, Syria, Lebanon with threats to other neighbouring nations.”
Migrant Tales’ eitorial board member Ahti Tolvanen (left) with Bruce Knotts, director of the NGO Committee of Disarmament, Peace and Security at the United Nations.
Remember, people thought that Hitler would be satisfied with Czechoslovakia, but he went on to take Poland, Netherlands, Belgium, France and more,” he added.
Bruce Knotts went on the address the ngo gathering on the day of the anniversary of the Helsinki Conference, August 1st .
I’m always amused and saddened at the same time when political bullies like Perussuomalaiset (PS)* Interior Minister Mari Rantanen talk tough against migrants and other vulnerable minorities. The only way to challenge bullies is by giving them a taste of their own medicine
A tough (but in reality a weak) Rantanen slaps us with an ultimatum:
Studying the possibility of prohibiting Muslim women from wearing veils. Live like the locals or leave.
In my opinion, this is chickenshit populism that we should not underestimate. In the United States, we are seeing how the Trump Administration is targeting brown and black people.
Who is to say that something similar would not happen in Finland if the PS had the chance?
It’s no secret that the PS is a party that quietly supports Trump and his authoritarian tactics.
Even the party’s chairperson and finance minister, Riikka Purra, had warm words of support for US Vice J.D. Vance speech last year at the Munich Security Conference, which many see as a turning point in EU-US relations. Vance downplayed the threat of Russia, claiming that Europe’s greatest security threat was unregulated migration and the exclusion of far-right political groups. Purra praised Vance’s words as a great speech. “Freedom, freedom of speech, democracy; threats from within, inability to fight illegal immigration,” she posted on X.
Here is a very simple question: if President Donald Trump had treated racism in the same way he treated antisemitism, would the United States have made real progress in eradicating this social ill—or at least delivered a serious blow against it?
This contrast is striking. While Trump signed executive orders pledging to combat antisemitism on college campuses, his administration presides over arbitrary ICE crackdowns on visible minorities and emboldened white supremacists. These contradictions raise serious questions about the sincerity and scope of his efforts.
One reason Trump’s stance on antisemitism rings hollow is that he himself has been repeatedly accused of antisemitic rhetoric. These accusations are not typically about open expressions of hatred, but about his recurring use of stereotypes: framing Jews as “disloyal,” obsessed with money, or more devoted to Israel than America.
In May 2025, Trump used the word “Shylock” in a speech—a slur rooted in Shakespeare’s caricature of a Jewish moneylender. Although he later claimed ignorance of its antisemitic meaning, groups such as the Anti-Defamation League warned that such language reinforces centuries-old prejudices.
Trump has also frequently suggested that Jewish Americans who vote for Democrats are “disloyal” or “ungrateful,” invoking the age-old dual-loyalty trope that questions Jews’ commitment to their country. In October 2024, he went even further, declaring that “Christians love Israel more than Jews,” a remark widely criticized by Jewish leaders as divisive and condescending.
But let’s be honest: Trump’s antisemitism is disingenuous and a travesty. If he’d invest so much time in cracking down on all kinds of racism, the US would take the first step towards becoming a more racially just country.
Trump and antisemitism pledges are nothing more than the warravaged landscape of Gaza.
The careful screening of civil society members allowed to attend the Helsinki+50 conference by the Finnish Foreign Ministry almost succeed in steering away conversation from topic the Finnish Chairpersonship wanted to avoid.
Fortunately Finnish Foreign Scholars were able to schedule a pre-event July 30th at Helsinki University Library where the undersigned was able to lay out how extensive military spending by OSCE countries was diverting the funds to address a looming global climate catastrophe on behalf Climate Reality Leaders Finland. There seemed no room for agenda for organizations like ours nor for Bruce Knotts who represented the NGO Committee for Disarmament, Peace and Security at the UN. He was likely too outspoken in his condemnation of countries like Finland engaging in arms trade with Israel. Heidi Meinzolt of the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom managed to get in an intervention on the dangerous comeback of the nuclear arms race in a July 31st side event, obviously a topic the organizers were having trouble keeping the lid on. This echoed Kati Juva’s warning of how even a limited nuclear exchange could trigger a civilization-destroying nuclear winter when she spoke on behalf of Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War at the university.
The elephant in the room was of course the ever more dictatorial behaviour of the Trump administration. Perhaps journalist and BBC interviewer Stephen Sackur forgot his briefing notes when he brought up how Trump had cut the funds for Radio Free Europe when questioning its CEO, Steve Capers about the imperilled state of the free media in parts of Europe?
Then there was the matter of the closure of Finland’s eastern border. Nothing on that of course much to the chagrin of the young Romanian woman, I met at a break, working for the UNHCR in Belorus with imprisoned migrant workers keep in dangerous and unhealthy cells after being pushed back for seeking the freedoms promised in the Helsinki Final Act. I mention her now because she never got a hearing of her experiences that day although travelling hundreds of kilometers to attend.
We all know about the vicious racist attacks by the Perussuomalaiset (PS)* party. Their partner in government, the National Coalition Party, has been flirting with populist-style racism as well—yesterday, Social Security Minister Sanni Grahn-Laasonen, whose responsibilities include gender equality.
On Tuesday, she told Helsingin Sanomat that she would be in favor of Finland joining the likes of France in prohibiting the niqab and burka. She added that these types of attire should be prohibited at school.
As Finland’s government parties continue to see their ratings go down in opinion polls, they are pulling these types of stunts to claw back voters.
The saddest matter is the harm that a minister like Grahn-Laasonen does to children who are Muslims and may use the niqab or veil. I wonder how many children Grahn-Laasonen has seen in Finland wearing a niqab or burka? This is an example of cheap populism.
Or should the issue play out in her world, where Muslim children will run up to her and thank her for liberating them?
The truth is that Grahn-Laasonen would care less for such children because she doesn’t believe in religious freedom.
Migrant Tales will begin to publish a regular weekly posting on the most racist/ xenophobic comments of the week. Why? Because the Perussuomalaiset (PS)* are bleeding in the polls and have therefore ratchet up their attacks against minorities like Muslims.
A new list will be published on Sundays.
Member of the European Parliament Sebastian Tynkkynen Tweets: “A question in the middle of summer: Is there anything good about Islam anywhere?
PerussuomalaisetMEP Sebastian Tynkkynen, 16 August 2025
MT comment:The charlatan hypocrisy of MEP Tynkkynen is striking! Here is a politician who has been convicted three times for ethnic agitation.
Tweets Tynkkynen: “Although this issue was not included in the government program and the RKP still believes that young girls can be veiled, Finland began investigating the ban on veils following a decision by Interior Minister Mari Rantanen.
Now pressure is being exerted on the RKP to introduce a ban on veils in Finland.
This is a matter of girls’ and women’s rights.”
Perussuomslaiset MEP Sebastian Tynkkynen, August 2025
MT comment:Read the above comment about Tynkkynen, who in our book is an opportunist poitician who would care less about the wellbeing of Muslim girls.
Kaisa Garedew is at it again with these two posts on Facebook: “Muslims to Muslim countries,” and “ALL oppresive Islamist headscarves in schools should be banned, including hijabs [veils].“
PS MP Kaisa Garedew, August 2025
MT Comment: It is pathetic that we have politicians like Garedew who believe that their mandate in parliament gives them the divine right to attack Muslims and sexual minorities.
PUBLISHED 12 AUGUST 2025
“Society must first and foremost take care of its own. That is why zero asylum seekers is a good goal. And that is also why, due to unhealthy incentives [to asylumm seekers], it is necessary to reduce state subsidies to a minimum, reduce the refugee-quota scheme to zero, and abolish municipal and regional area compensation for integration.“
Mari Rantanen, Perussuomalaiset (PS)* minister of the interior, 12 August 2025
MT comment:Mari Rantanen is spearheading the PS’ plan to halt asylum seekers to zero even if it means ditching our respect for human rights. Rantanen’s and the PS’ thinking is the following: never trust migrants and pass laws that message your great suspicion of them.
“Why do we have to force these cultures, which are frankly fucked, upon Finland? How is it possible that we have political parties that support the beating of women? Women are not beaten in Western countries! Think about it! Women are beaten on the streets of “liberal” Europe and Finland. I don’t want this kind of Finland.“
Laura Huhtasaari is an MP for PS, August 2025
MT comment:Huhtasaari was a rising star fuelled by her hatred of Muslims. As if rising from the grave after a long lapse of silence, Huhtasaari falsely claims that “women are not beaten in Western countries.” She forgets to mention that Finland is the second most violent place in Europe for women.
“The ban on headscarves is only the first step in saving Finland from Islamization. Islam does not belong in Finland.“
Kaisa Garedew, PS MP, 11 August 2025
MT comment: Kaisa Garedew is one of the most hateful politicians in Finland. Her comments about Islam show that she has unresolved issues.
“I am truly concerned. There are many Islamic groups in Finland, some of which are covert. They operate under the guise of the Palestinian issue and are growing rapidly in Finland. I have informed the security police about them. For my own safety, I cannot name or reveal them here. For example, there is a large network in Oulu…
…I can provide further information about the organizations and their connections.“
Katariina Reponen, Hyvinkää city councilor, Perussuommalaiset, August 2025
MT comment: Reponen is another PS politicians who sees Muslims under her bed and even claims to work with the security police to uncover Islamic groups, which she claims are a danger to society. Paranoia?
Signed August 1st, 1975, by 35 nations including the United States, Canada, and nearly all European countries, The Helsinki Final Act was a landmark agreement aimed at reducing Cold War tensions and promoting cooperation across political, economic, and human rights domains. It enshrined principles such as sovereign equality, territorial integrity, the peaceful settlement of disputes and respect for human rights—ideals that remain aspirational in today’s fractured geopolitical landscape.
As the meeting to honour the 50th anniversary of The Helsinki Final Act opened on July 31st at Helsinki’s Finlandia Hall we were invited by the Finnish Chairpersonship to consider a program without reference to the looming threat of another nuclear arms race as limiting treaties expire and scant reference to a mounting environmental crises. Many countries that had signed in 1975 were now providing support to Ukraine fighting a Russian invasion and at the same time supporting Israel’s genocide of Gazans.
Finlandia Hall. Sourrce: Google
Meanwhile aggressive threats such as by President Trump to annex Canada and Greenland were mainly ignored on the agenda. Humanity’s existential climate and environmental crises received barely passing reference as billions are transferred to a massive environment-destroying military build-up. In fact these burning issues of the day might not have been mentioned at all were it not for the minority of carefully screened civil society attendees allowed in to join the nearly 1000 official delegates.
🧬 Humanity’s Expanding Biological Footprint
Since 1975, the global population has more than doubled, and with it, humanity’s biological footprint has surged. Industrial agriculture, deforestation, and fossil fuel consumption have accelerated biodiversity loss and climate change. The ecological overshoot—where human demand exceeds Earth’s regenerative capacity—has become a defining feature of the Anthropocene.
💰 World GDP: Then, Now, and Ahead
1975 World GDP: Estimated at around $5.5 trillion USD (nominal).
2025 World GDP: Surpasses $113 trillion USD.
Projected 2055 GDP: At a steady 2.5% annual growth, global GDP could reach approximately $240 trillion USD in 30 years, assuming compounding growth and relative stability.
This economic expansion has lifted billions out of poverty but also intensified resource extraction, emissions, and environmental deterioration.
🛡️ NATO’s Expansion and Contradictions
Since the Cold War’s end, NATO has expanded eastward, incorporating former Warsaw Pact members and Soviet republics such as Poland, Hungary, the Baltic states, and most recently Finland and Sweden. While framed as a stabilizing force, this expansion has been viewed by Russia as a strategic threat, contributing to tensions that culminated in the 2022 invasion of Ukraine.
NATO countries have largely condemned Russia’s aggression and provided extensive military aid to Ukraine. Yet, many of these same nations have continued arms sales and diplomatic support for Israel during its military campaign in Gaza, which human rights organizations and international observers have described as genocidal in scale. This duality has sparked criticism over selective application of international law and human rights norms.
💣 Military Spending and Emissions
NATO’s collective military spending has surged dramatically in the past decade, driven by renewed great-power competition and regional conflicts. The alliance’s defense budgets now exceed $1.3 trillion annually, with the U.S. alone accounting for nearly half.
This militarization carries an environmental cost: NATO’s greenhouse gas emissions exceed those of over 50% of the world’s nations, according to independent climate assessments. Military operations, supply chains, and infrastructure contribute significantly to global emissions, yet remain largely exempt from international climate treaties.
🧨 Nuclear Treaties and Strategic Instability
Key arms control agreements such as the INF Treaty and New START have either expired or been suspended, eroding decades of nuclear stability. The absence of binding treaties raises the spectre of a renewed arms race, with hypersonic weapons and AI-driven targeting systems adding complexity and risk.
