Some Russian asylum seekers expressed outrage of the ill-treatment of a single, 64-year-old woman from the Ukraine who was carried away by force from the Eastern Finnish Imatra asylum reception center.
“This is not the way to great a human,” said a Russian asylum seeker who got in touch with Migrant Tales. “We are not animals. We have human rights, too.”
So what justified the use of such force by the police?
Apparently, the woman, refused to go to the hospital because she fears deportation to Russia.
“There was another case [at the same asylum reception center] of a Russian woman called Ludmila who was sent to the hospital, [allegedly] drugged and then deported to Russia,” she said. “Later on she appeared in Turkey after being forced to return to Russia.”
If you have any information about what happened or about the elderly woman in the pictures, please get in touch with us at [email protected]
The 44,746 deaths of people attempting to cross the Mediterranean and deaths due to Fortress Europe policies are another black spot on Europe. The deaths span from 1993 to June 1. Our indifference and apathy to this humanitarian crisis make the Mediterranean and Europe grow into a grave with unknown and forgotten people.
Indifference is one issue about our shameful behavior. But, others, like some of our politicians who would not care an iota if people who flee wars, hunger, and poverty die.
Migrant Tales wrote back then: A total of 234 Euro election candidates answered Alma Media’s election compass, a total of 85 (36.3%) stated that they either “strongly disagree,” “disagree,” or are “neutral” (have no opinion) about the following claim: “Is it the obligation of the EU to save all those migrants who attempt to come to Europe and are at risk of drowning in the Mediterranean?”
The answers above were by Finnish MEP candidates who should know better.
An interesting video posted by a CaroxElMundo, who tells us in Spanish about her experiences about Finland, makes a very good observation: Finland promotes gender equality, but all other types of equality take a back seat.
She makes a valid point.
Finland has made a lot of progress in gender rights. There are still many things that have to be set right: women make on average 20% less than men at work, Finland is one of the most violent countries in the EU for women to live in. It was only 37 years ago when women won the right to pass on Finnish nationality to their children, even if they won the right to vote in 1906.
An ad from the 1960s that states that it is a “white man’s” cigarette. I guess this means that the cigarette brand was not meant for Roma and other visible minorities. The ad was made when women could give birth to children but not pass on nationality to them.
There are a lot of myths surrounding social equality in Finland.
The myths that are perpetuated permit institutional racism and discrimination to stay intact.
The myth reaches its most vulgar proportions at many “integration” courses for newcomers are, in reality, courses where you are fed Finnish exceptionalism. You are taught a lot about using public services but rarely talked about fighting for your rights and being treated equally before the law.
For this reason, the process of learning about your place in Finland can come as a rude surprise for some. It may also come as a lesser surprise if you learn this harsh reality in drips and drabs.
Finland’s Romany population got a rude reminder of the racism and ethnic profiling women from that group have to endure daily. You’d think that a country like Finland, which claims to uphold Nordic values, knows that ethnic profiling is not only illegal and insulting to the individual and group.
Migrant Tales has maintained for a long time that if the media were serious about the racist treatment that some people endure in this country, they have abundant evidence from the country’s 10,000-strong Romany minority.
While there is abundant evidence about racism against the Roma, the interesting question is why has it continued for so long, and why has the response of the authorities and politicians been so lukewarm?
Leif Hagert was named the Young European of the Year in May. Hagert, who has been outspoken on Roma rights in Finland, states that the Roma made history on Saturday when they demonstrated against ethnic profiling by security guards at markets. The name of the demonstration was “The Right to Breathe.” The Roma started to speak out against discrimination in the 1970s.
Hagert told Migrant Tales by phone that the time to react to discrimination in Finland is now.
“Discrimination against the Roma must be addressed by others apart from the Roma. Together, we must break the current culture of allowing [people and authorities] to treat the Roma as they please,” said Hagert. “Structural racism requires the intervention of decision-makers. Words alone are not enough. Action is needed.”
I was shocked but not surprised when US Vice President Kamala Harris warned would-be Guatemalans fleeing corruption, violence, and poverty. What Harris said in Guatemala was shameful and dishonest.
“I want to be clear to folks in the region who make that dangerous trek to the Unites States-Mexican border – do not come, do not come,” she was quoted as saying in The Guardian. “The United States will continue to enforce our laws and secure our border. There are legal methods by which migration should and can occur. But one of our priorities is to discourage illegal migration, and I believe if you to our border, you will be turned back.”
Harris’ warning was shrouded by US hegemony in the region with a lack of historical context.
There is a reason why Central American countries like Guatemala are known as banana republics.
A video clip showing what happened to former Guatemalan President Jacobo Arbenz for challenging the United Fruit Company of Boston.
Even if Vice President Harris suffers from a bout of historic amnesia, the US under Ronald Reagan was responsible for giving the green light to former General Efraín Ríos Montt, who was tried and convicted of genocide and war crimes that left an estimated 200,000 dead.
According to The Center for Justice & Accountability, “General Efraín Ríos Montt came to power in Guatemala through a coup in March 1982. A month later, he launched a “scorched earth” operation against the country’s Ixil Maya population. Under Ríos Montt’s dictatorship, the army and its paramilitary units systematically annihilated over 600 villages.”
Kaksi kuvaa, jotka kertovat paljon siitä keitä ovat Perussuomalaiset. Kuvissa on tuomittuja kuntavaaliehdokkaita törkeästä lapsen seksuaalisesta hyväksikäytöstä parituksesta ja petoksista. Perussuomalaiset vakuuttavat, että heillä kuitenkin on “jotain rajaa.”
Missä se raja on?
Sitten tekopyhyys saa vauhtia kun Helsingin Perussuomalaiset julkaisivat mainoksen jossa näkyy nainen burkassa. Vaikka burkaan-pukeutuvia naisia voi Suomessa laskea sormilla. Mainos antaa ymmärtää ettei burkan käyttö voisi olla vapaaehtoista.
Tasa-arvo tarkoittaa todennäköisesti Perussuomalaisille sitä, ettei sinulla ole oikeus käyttää huivia, niqab, burka tai olla muslimi, koska perussuomalaiset miehet tietävät paremmin.
Rasismi riehuu Suomessa ja erityisen paljon Perussuomalaisessa puolueessa.
It is a good sign that some Finnish media like Yle are fact-checking what politicians say. However, it is a bit too late because the Perussuomalaiset (PS)* have built their popularity on making false claims about migrants.
I’m pretty certain that if we were to do a fact-check on all the claims about migrants since 2010, most of them would be false, grossly exaggerated, and outright lies.
In just a matter of a week, PS chairperson Jussi Halla-aho, who was convicted in 2012 for ethnic agitation and breaching the sanctity of religion, got called out for making false statements about migrants.
One of these false statements made by Halla-aho recently was that low-wage workers come to Finland, work for a few months, and then quit their jobs and live off social welfare. This is totally false.
Halla-aho made another false statement when he stated that one-third of income, housing benefit recipients are immigrants.
It’s one of the oldest tricks in the books used against journalists by xenophobic politicians is the following: A politician makes an outrageous claim to a journalist, who doesn’t even bother to question its veracity. Eventually, the journalist may do some investigating and find out that he or she was fed malarkey. By then it’s too late because the story is already out there.
For the PS, migrants and foreigners are a non-stop obsession. Some, like Halla-aho, have built their political career on victimizing, bashing, and spreading racist lies and exaggerations about migrants.
Jussi Halla-aho, the chairperson of the Islamophobic Perussuomalaiset (PS)*, exposed another spoonful of its ever-visible far-right credentials on Saturday by demanding a 3,000-euro a month salary minimum for migrants to get a residence permitand weakening workers’ rights.
The PS leader, who was convicted in 2012 for ethnic agitation and breaching the sanctity of religion, believed that the best way to lower unemployment would be cutbacks in unemployment security, watering down protection against dismissal, do away with national collective bargaining agreements and undermine employers the right to strike.
Considering Halla-aho’s racist views of migrants in general and Muslims in particular, his views to dismantle Finland’s welfare state do not come as a surprise.
Even if the PS is leading in opinion polls, the party’s biggest folly will be at the end of the day their racist and neo-conservative economic views.
The Perussuomalaiset (PS)* party is the biggest threat to our Nordic welfare state and democracy. Their xenophobic ideology reveals a noticeable conflict.
Gunnar Myrdal (1898.1987), a Swedish economist who did a groundbreaking study in the early 1940s about its racism, brought this dilemma to light:
“How can they [USAmericans] claim to respect the dignity of all persons, equality, and the inalienable rights to freedom, justice, and a fair opportunity, while countenancing pervasive violations of the dignity of blacks and their rights to that freedom, that justice, and that fair opportunity?”
In the same light, we can ask to whom and how social equality, one of our Nordic welfare state pillars, applies to migrants and minorities? Do these noble values apply to Muslims, people of color, and other visible migrants and minorities? Are we also living in a conflict where we preach one thing but do the opposite?
Take, for instance, one of PS’s first vice-president Riikka Purra’s reaction Fardowsa Mahamoud’s decision not to do military service because the hijab, or veil, is still prohibited.
Ever wondered the source of the strong undercurrent of xenophobia in present-day Finland? The answer is in its history. During independence, Finland has been quite an unfriendly country towards foreigners. The Restricting Act of 1939 speaks volumes. Did you know that Finland passed its first immigration act in 1983 or about 66 years after gaining independence?
The prevailing xenophobic attitude and suspicion of foreigners reveal a lot of things like the rise of the far-right Perussuomnalaiset (PS)*.
It also explains why the Finnish Security and Intelligence Service (Supo) interviewed every candidate who applied before for Finnish citizenship. I was one of them.
My interview with Supo took over two hours, and the first question that asked was, “why are you applying for Finnish citizenship?”
My answer was straightforward: “Because it’s my right.”
A tabloid Ilta-Sanomat billboard from 1992. Much of the hostility that people of color faced in the 1990s was by the media. Here, the tabloid states that Somalis conned the authorities to get asylum in Finland.
Behind that response, because it’s my right, came from my insistence that since my mother was Finnish, I too should be considered a Finn. Even if Finnish women had the right to vote from 1906, they weren’t trusted until 1984 to give Finnish citizenship to their children. Only Finnish men could do that.
Prior to the interview with Supo, I had some issues with the honorary consul of Mali in Helsinki called Jalkanen. When I went to visit him to get a visa to that West African country, he appeared inebriated and was very suspicious about me visiting Mali.
At the time I worked for Apu magazine, and wanted to do a travel piece on Mali and Niger.
At the meeting with Jalkanen, his suspicion grew as we spoke. He then called a friend of his who was a Supo agent. He asked him to pry into my secret Interpol files to make a background check. His Supo friend called back quite rapidly.
Jalkanen started to speak after hanging up the phone with his friend.
