Without anything better to do than to provoke visible migrants, some 30 members of the far-right Soldiers of Odin were at East Helsinki’s Puhos shopping mall on Monday, according to a video by Finnish Somalimedia Warsan.
According to the Helsinki Times, “shoppers and visitors of the mall were frightened by the group and stayed inside the shops. The show off seems to have gone without incidents or violence. Police presence can also be seen In the video, although they do not seem to interfere. ”
While the Soldiers of Odin have not given any statement about their presence at the East Helsinki shopping mall, it’s clear that the far-right group, which has close ideological ties with neo-Nazi groups, is desperate for attention.
Apart from some cities in Finland like Kemi, where the group is active, the original aim of the Soldiers of Odin is to protect Finnish white women and children from Muslims.
The Finnish police’s and media’s ambiguous stand against the vigilante group gave it some acceptance in Finland.
One may rightfully ask why was it so difficult for the police and media to grasp immediately that the Soldiers of Odin are a symptom of a social ill.
The answer is obvious.
See the video here.
The Puhos mall was in the news in February when the police, Border Guard, health officials carried out spot checks at the East Helsinki shopping center.
Migrant Tales wrote back then: “While it is a good matter that the Helsinki police service is accountable for its actions, the tweets say nothing about the police’s alleged behavior at the mosque. Why did they spot check everyone who entered and left the mosque? What about the police dog and the shoes? There is no tweet about a policeman who allegedly snapped back and said that ‘this was his country’ and that he had a right to ask the person for his ID.”