Migrant Tales, Author at Migrant tales

Petteri Orpo, Mari Rantanen, Riikka Purra, and the government show contempt for Human Rights

Posted on December 10, 2023December 10, 2023 by Migrant Tales

It is shameful, but obvious, why Prime Minister Petteri Orpo’s government, not one minister of the National Coalition Party and Perussuomalaiset,* mentions International Human Rights Day. Being white, driven by xenophobia and having a privileged life in Finland, it is understandable why such politicians see Human Rights as a threat.

Former President Tarja Halonen (2000-2012) commemorated in a Tween below International Human Rights Day.

During the Cold War, Human Rights was a no-no in Finland because it questioned Finnish-Soviet relations. Finland joined the Council of Europe in 1989, 39 years after its founding in 1950, which held the banner of Human Rights high.

As an Argentinean who lived under a dictatorship in 1976-83, Human Rights have a special place in my heart. Thanks to such rights, Argentineans had a voice in the face of violent oppression.

In April 1978, I was stopped by the police at gunpoint in the street, detained and thrown in a police cell without the right to habeas corpus, a Human Right.

I still remember that autumn Saturday as if it were yesterday.

Minister Mari Rantanen and the government aim to trash human rights

Posted on December 9, 2023December 9, 2023 by Migrant Tales

Is it a coincidence that Perussuomalaiset (PS)* Interior Minister Mari Rantanen’s letter Tuesday to the EU Commission on scraping asylum rights temporarily is an accidental coincidence? News of Rantanen’s letter, which has received harsh criticism from Professor of International Law Matti Koskenniemi, was published after a story by The Guardian claiming global inaction on human rights could fuel “mass atrocities” and over 1,000 unmarked graves were discovered on EU migration routes.

Interioir Minister Mari Rantanen is the dark face of Finland’s immigration policy who wants to put on ice human rights for asylum seekers. Some consider her an incompetent minister driven by Islamophobia and xenophobia. Source: Yle

While Professor Koksenniemi slammed Rantanen’s letter to the EU Commission as “unbelievable and incomprehensible,” not one minister, never mind Prime Minister Petteri Orpo, has questioned or commented on Rantanen’s letter to overhaul the asylum system.

Even President Sauli Niinistö, whose job is to oversee Finland’s foreign policy, has not uttered a word.

Rantanen’s letter to the EU Commission is another black stain on how the present government is undermining systematically human and civil rights in Finland.

“The whole purpose of this [refugee] system is to protect people in need,” Koskenniemi was quoted as saying in Demokraatti. “And the minister wants to attack this system without saying anything about what the purpose of this system is.”

Rantanen does not mention the word “refugee” once in the letter to the EU Commission.

Ydin: Suomalaisista katujengeistä

Posted on December 6, 2023December 7, 2023 by Migrant Tales

Viimeisin kirjoitus Ydin-lehdessä (4/2023) vanhasta ja ajankohdasta aiheesta.

President Sauli Niinistö’s last dance

Posted on December 6, 2023December 6, 2023 by Migrant Tales

THE OPINION PIECE WAS UPDATED

Much of Finland’s hostility towards asylum seekers and visible minorities lies on President Sauli Niinistö, who hosts today his last Independence Day gala. For some, like me, this is good news. Hopefully, Finland’s next president will have a greater understanding of migrants, cultural diversity and peace-building.

Ahti Tolvanen, who is a member of the Migrant Tales board, believes that President Niinistö failed in his job number one.

“One of the areas that President Niinist failed was maintaining Finland as a peacekeeping nation,” he said. “He just walked away from decades of a tradition in The Helsinki Spirit.”

The Helsinki Spirit was the basis of Finland’s foreign policy grounded on détente and non-involvement and not taking sides in conflicts.

President Niinistö dancing with his wife Jenni Haukio at the Independence Day gala.

During the past eight years of his mandate, President Niinistö has shown his hostility towards asylum seekers, especially Muslims, and other people of color. He was never a friend of such communities.

President Niinistö’s prejudices and apparent ignorance about racism are one source that feeds Finland’s hostile environment against migrants and minorities. Some of his comments and stances (see below) leave some scratching their heads.

Questioning dual citizenship rights is another indication of Finland’s path to greater insularity

Posted on December 6, 2023April 3, 2024 by Migrant Tales

Why is the dual citizenship issue being raised again by Yle? According to a survey of MPs, 34 would block dual Finnish-Russian citizenship, while 36 said they would not. Twenty-six had no opinion.

Is it surprising that the majority of MPs who want to restrict dual citizenship are members of the Perussuomalaiset (PS)* and National Coalition Party?

The whole issue of dual citizenship should be seen as another step in the road of insularity and xenophobia. It’s concerning because if the government succeeds at excluding Russians from enjoying dual citizenship, other nationalities will follow. What else could you expect from the present government?

Source: Yle.

The government of Prime Minister Petteri Orpo plans to tighten citizenship laws. Some of the measures include raising the residence requirement for citizenship to eight from five years. Are there plans to do away with dual citizenship rights as well?

After the Cold War and joining the EU in 1995, Finland passed a number of laws that aimed to make the country more inclusive. With the tightening of immigration laws and the hostile view of outsiders by the present government, some believe that Finland wants to return to the days when the country did everything possible to exclude and make life difficult for foreigners.

Racism and xenophobia will turn Finland into a Nordic Hungary

Posted on December 3, 2023December 3, 2023 by Migrant Tales

Since 2011, Finland has found a powerful political force in racism. If the country heads down the path of Hungary, it will do so with fearmongering about migrants and how such people abuse and use social welfare at the cost of white Finns.

Even if the Perussuomalaiset (PS)* don’t hide their disdain for migrants and admiration of authoritarian regimes like the one in Hungary, parties like the National Coalition Party are helping to turn the country on its autocratic side.

Human Rights and the present rule of law guaranteed in our constitution are being targeted.

The following red lights are flashing loudly. Prime Minister Orpo can only utter “that the government has a good program.”

Some flashing red lights are:

Yahya Rouissi: To whom this may concern

Posted on December 2, 2023December 2, 2023 by Migrant Tales

Media, high pillar of civilization, pride of the developed world, crown jewel of any democracy, far (rightly) from being biased, “fair”, “free” and “ethical”… The title is addressing you.

You can cut all the flowers, but you cannot keep spring from coming.

Pablo Neruda

As we navigate daily “a” distorted gallery, the glaring contrast between the spotlight cast on some and
the shadows shrouding others becomes an uncomfortable tableau. The dichotomy echoes the
oppressive silence enforced by the Western media that “beautify and nose-powder”, confining information and strangely by selectively applying censorship. In this unsettling narrative, objectivity is the art of selective disclosure that taints a casualty and information. As we traverse (ironically) the landscape of double standards, let’s pick some of the information and look it up from the mainstream.

While it only took 49 days of genocide and 8,000 children killed to get an article like the one below from the New York Times, and a change of heart in some other outlets, the media in Europe is a far cry from the noble Western values for human rights, at least the same way it glowed when it was about Ukraine. It’s worth reminding that Germany, for example, charged Russia with war crimes for ONE indiscriminate missile attack that killed 22 people. Israel has done this approximately 1,000 times.

The full article of the New York Times here: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/25/world/middleeast/israel-gaza-death-toll.html

There are a few many things that don’t comply with the proclaimed Western values when it comes to
this matter: Journalists from there aren’t that much valued, supported, or protected by their
“colleagues” in Europe. The number of journalists that have been killed (67) is practically a
record that has never been recorded before, and the silence about it is no less significant.

Fake news by Finnish Interior Minister Mari Rantanen on how to take the media for a ride

Posted on November 29, 2023November 29, 2023 by Migrant Tales

Finland’s Perussuomalaiset (PS)* interior minister, Mari Rantanen, has pulled another fast one on the media. Anti-immigration politicians usually make outrageous statements that are then rebuffed by the media. It is a course in Fake News 101.

Even if Interior Minister Mari Rantanen admits her claim, that millions of migrants are coming to Finland, to be “a childish mistake,” it is far from that. Politicians constantly make outrageous claims. It does not matter if the politician admits to the mistake later because the news is already out there with their followers. Source: Yle

On Tuesday, Rantanen claimed on A-studio that “millions of undocumented migrants” could come to Finland.

On Wednesday, the following day, she admitted to the “childish mistake.”

“I meant that in Russia there are around 10 million foreigners of which 1-2 million are residing illegally,” she added.

Jussi Lassila, a researcher at the Finnish Institution of Foreign Affairs, said that it was an exaggeration to talk about all the undocumented people in Russia when considering the number of people who might come to Finland.

Close the Finnish-Russian border and leave everything to chance

Posted on November 28, 2023November 28, 2023 by Migrant Tales

I have always said that if there were another government, preferably without the National Coalition Party (NCP) and Perussuomalaiset (PS)*, the decision to shut the Russian-Finnish border would have some credibility.

Source: X (formerly Twitter).

The decision to close the border is first and foremost a political decision. It is a good way to shift attention from the painful austerity measures Prime Minister Petteri Orpo plans to implement.

The closing of the border also reinforces what we’ve known for a long time: the PS and NCP don’t care about human rights.

According to the Guardian, Annika Sandlund, the UN refugee agency’s representative to the Nordic and Baltic countries, said closing all border crossing points would be “contrary to international law”.

Riikka Purra and the PS are desparate and fear being exposed for what they are: liars

Posted on November 27, 2023November 27, 2023 by Migrant Tales

Radical right Perussuoalaiset (PS)* chairperson, Riikka Purra, like Interior Minister Mari Rantanen, loathes Muslims and other minorities. Slamming and suggesting that Deputy Chancellor of Justice Mikko Puumalainen is a”liberal moron,” exposes her hatred and desperation.

Purra, the one who said she’d shoot migrant youths on a train in 2008, now takes out her crystal ball and claims to be a clairvoyant.

She writes that the people coming from Russia to the border “are not genuine asylum seekers,” adding that they “have nothing to worry about and are not fleeing [war].”

If Purra claims that these people aren’t real asylum seekers, we could say that her concern about “national security” due to a few hundred asylum seekers coming to the border is hogwash. In 2015, we had thousands of asylum seekers entering Finland from Iraq and Afghanistan and nobody raised serious outcries about national security. As we can see, it is all a political stunt by Purra and her party.

But here is the question: Why is Purra so eager about trashing our international agreements that are protected, according to her, by “liberal morons.”