UPDATE: Helsinki Times: Pakistani stabbed several times in the Finnish city of Vantaa

Posted on by Migrant Tales

A Pakistani was stabbed several times on Friday night in Vantaa, according to Helsinki Times. The victim is 37 and the father of a four-year-old child. 

UPDATE: The police service put out a statement Tuesday about the stabbing. It gave no details except that the investigation is ongoing. A story in Helsingin Sanomat quotes detective chief inspector, Mikko Minkinen, was quoted as saying that apparently, it wasn’t a hate crime.

Writes Helsinki Times: “Assailants inflicted 20-30 stab wounds on the victim using knives and other edged weapons. His lips were also cut, and was stabbed near the eye. Fortunately, the victim was transferred to hospital urgently and underwent a major surgery. Although still in ICU [intensive care unit] and in critical condition with severe injuries, his situation is not life-threatening anymore, and he has regained consciousness.”

The attack happened on Friday and Helsinki Times is apparently the only paper in Finland that reported the incident.

As usual, the police has taken its time in putting out a statement about the motive of the crime.

Read the full story here.

If something is interesting to watch, it is the police and how long it will take to update us on the terrible incident.

Continue reading “UPDATE: Helsinki Times: Pakistani stabbed several times in the Finnish city of Vantaa”

Exposing white Finnish privilege #50: Caving in to white narratives

Posted on by Migrant Tales

February 10 was the first anniversary of the #TheRightToLife movement that raised awareness and concern over Finland’s asylum policy. The date aimed to host a lecture-performance at the Kiasma Finnish national gallery of Helsinki by Riikka Theresa Innanen called Touch and Revolution.

The plan of the performance was, however, changed 24 hours before it debuted. All the sudden, Innanen was the only artist allowed to go on stage due to an unclear security threat.

“We even planned to invite the audience to come on stage for tea and conversation,” said a statement by the organizers of the lecture-performance. “Considering the presence of asylum-seekers in our team and their vulnerability, it was a shock for us to be confronted with consequences such as arrest, if we did not comply. We felt that not only our artistic freedom but also our safety is being jeopardized.”

According to the artists, Kiasma, which was instrumental in helping the #RightToLife movement, did not at any moment make clear what the security threat was.

And here lies the problem, according to Hami Bahadori, a local artist who was part of the artist group. He said that he is not the representative of al migrant communities in Helsinki and was simply a part of the lecture-performance group.

“The fact that our group was diverse and made by artists with different backgrounds, privileges, and roles, brings this issue more into attention,” he said.  “We were simply a group of artists trying to do our job in an art museum”

“Instead of exposing the sources of these [far-right]  threats,” he continued. “Kiasma is outsourcing its responsibility to companies to hide the threats. If there is a threat, it’s the job of a democratic society like Finland to stand up to such intimidation.”

 

The #RightToLife movement helped asylum seekers to have a say in their dire situation.

White Finnish privilege #50

Continue reading “Exposing white Finnish privilege #50: Caving in to white narratives”

QUOTE OF THE DAY: Populism is like pissing in your pants

Posted on by Migrant Tales

“Populism is like pissing in your pants in freezing temperatures. It may feel good for a moment, but you soon understand it was a dumb idea. You now have two problems instead of one: freezing temperature and your freezing-cold urine.”

 

Hungary’s Viktor Orbán is an example of pissing in one’s pants in freezing temperatures. Read the full story here.

Speaking to two asylum seekers detained at the Joutseno immigration removal center

Posted on by Migrant Tales

A twenty-four-year-old asylum seeker, which Finland has tried to deport twice and failed, has been locked up for about two months at the Joutseno immigration removal center. The question is for how long can the authorities keep a man locked up for simply refusing to be deported?

The man, who is from Iraq and has two rejections for asylum in Finland, asks through his English-speaking roommate who to publish pictures of how he was beaten up by the police after be was forced off the plane.

“I came to Finland when I was sixteen and I’ve been locked up at Joutseno for one month,” he said on the phone. “I don’t understand why I’m going to be deported since my brother, who is living in Finland for four years, got asylum for the same reasons I told Migri [the Finnish Immigration Service].”

The young asylum seeker, who is also from Iraq, said that his father lives in Germany as a resident.


A picture of the twenty-four-year-old asylum seeker after he was removed from the plane. He alleges that the police hit him. In one picture not shown his teeth appear to be damaged possibly from the impact of a fist.

Continue reading “Speaking to two asylum seekers detained at the Joutseno immigration removal center”

UPDATE: Three suicide attempts allegedly took place within a month at the Joutseno immigration removal center

Posted on by Migrant Tales

The Joutseno immigration removal center must be a horrible place to spend your last days or weeks in Finland. Migrant Tales has heard that there have been at least three suicide attempts, two allegedly “successful” with one person hospitalized. 

Since the immigration removal center or the Finnish Immigration Service (Migri) hasn’t confirmed what happened, we have to rely on other sources from within the immigration removal center. This is what we know so far:

  • About 20 days ago an eighteen-year-old Moroccan took his life;
  • Three days ago another young asylum seeker attempted to hang himself but was thwarted by his cellmate at the last moment. He is in hospital;
  • UPDATED: Last night, allegedly a twenty-two-old Iraqi (not Moroccan) took his life.

As mentioned, these are unconfirmed reports given by asylum seekers at the immigration removal center. We hope that Migri or the interior ministry will keep us up to date on what is happening at Joutseno.

An asylum seeker at Joutseno asked about the person who attempted suicide and they would not give any information on the matter.

This picture was taken on Saturday and allegedly a Moroccan national, 22, took his life at the Joutseno immigration removal center.

 

What happened at the Jouseno immigration removal center Saturday? Was there another suicide attempt?

Posted on by Migrant Tales

Migrant Tales has heard that a Moroccan national, who was allegedly put in solitary confinement, attempted to take his life Saturday. This is not the first case in a short while but there are two more. One of these allegedly ended in death. 

The snapshot below was apparently taken Saturday evening.

We will not post the video because it could expose the person’s identity and put him in harm’s way in his home country.

A man is being taken away on a stretcher.

 

UPDATED (25.2 at 9.53 am):

 

This is an ongoing story. It will be updated.

Another suicide attempt takes place at the Joutseno immigration removal center

Posted on by Migrant Tales

Migrant Tales has heard that a Moroccan national has allegedly attempted suicide at the Joutseno immigration removal canter of eastern Finland, according to a source who spoke on condition of anonymity. Two sources speak of three suicide attempts but these are unconfirmed. 

It would be good matter if the authorities at the Joutseno immigration removal center make public how many have died while attempting suicide and if the latest case was successful.

UPDATE from another source at 1.33am:

The police officer, and the asylum seeker’s lighter: “I’ll give it back to you in Baghdad”

Posted on by Migrant Tales

A twenty-one-year-old Iraqi asylum seeker, who was miraculously saved from deportation twice, told about his last ordeal. He remembers a woman police office in Mikkeli who took his lighter and said she would return it in Baghdad. 

The police officer took the asylum seeker’s lighter when they were smoking together. He offered her his lighter because the police officer din’t have a light.

“She kept the lighter and said that she’d give it back in Baghdad,” he said, confirming that she still hasn’t returned the lighter to him.

The lighter that the woman police officer promised to give back in Baghdad. She still has it and hasn’t returned it.

Is this the way the Finnish police acts with asylum seekers who are in shock and worried about their deportation?

Continue reading “The police officer, and the asylum seeker’s lighter: “I’ll give it back to you in Baghdad””

Finnair flight AY1433 to Berlin and the sad case of a deportee – #boycottfinnair!

Posted on by Migrant Tales

A couple traveled to Berlin on a Finnair flight Thursday. The passenger that witnessed a forced deportation on the flight wrote about it on her Facebook wall. Helsinki police chief inspector, Liisa Lintuluoto, denied in MTV3 that anything of the sort had happened on the flight.  

Writes the woman who saw the asylum seeker on the flight:

“On Fnnair flight AY1433 from Helsinki to Berlin there was a person who was being deported. There were two men sitting beside the man in the last row of the plane. His hands were bound with a cable tie. The man had blood coming from a wound in his head that was treated in a rudimentary manner. The man was shaking and looked into my eyes and said, ‘Please help me!’ After this, his mouth was taped and his head was placed between the knees, which was how he was detained. The police who accompanied him made it impossible to communicate with the person, who was suffering greatly.

Every person is entitled to being treated in a respectful manner with his human rights irrespective of the situation.

I will never forget that person’s suffering eyes and his pleas for help.”

The original posting on Facebook.

Migrant Tales knows one of the persons who saw what happened on the Finnair flight to Berlin.

Who do I believe?

The denials of the police in MTV3 are revealing. It’s what they don’t say that incriminates them.

Another culprit is Finnair. It is the national carrier of a country that is criticized by Amnesty International for its human rights violations of asylum seekers.

I will boycott Finnair, and I hope you do the same.

#boycottfinnair!

Asylum seeker in detention cell 208: “I’ll be released again – I hope I’ll never have to see this place again”

Posted on by Migrant Tales

A supreme administrative court order today stopped Monday’s deportation of an Iraqi asylum seeker in detention cell 208 (detained last year in cell 406). It was in November when the twenty-one-year-old asylum seeker, after being held for 32 days, was released under the same circumstances. 

At  4:30 pm sharp a guard at the Joutseno* immigration removal center told him that he’d released shortly.

The joy was evident in the asylum seeker’s voice as he vowed to never return to the immigration removal center.

“I’ll be released again,” he said. “I hope I’ll never have to see this place again.”

* The asylum seeker who was locked up in this cell thought he was in Lappeenranta but in fact he was at the Joutseno immigration removal center located 20km away.