Migrant Tales’ response to the Helsinki police service’s actions at the Puhos shopping center

Posted on by Migrant Tales

The Helsinki police service tweeted today that 260 people were spot checked at the Puhos shopping center of Eastern Helsinki on Saturday where two people with warrants for their arrest and two “illegal” or undocumented migrants were apprehended. The number of people arrested by the police was a mere 1.5% of all those they spot checked. 

The Helsinki police tweeted as well that those that were spot checked weren’t registered as alleged by Migrant Tales. They also said, as we know, carry out similar spot checks at different shopping centers elsewhere.

The Helsinki police claim that both Finns and foreigners were spot checked. We do not know, however, how many white Finns were stopped and if those Finns they stopped were second-generation or naturalized Finns.

Considering that people from the Middle East and countries like Somali visit the Puhos shopping center and that they are vulnerable visible migrants and minorities who suffer from high unemployment and social exclusion, it is odd that the police would claim as in a statement that the spot checks were “done in very good spirits.”

Who likes to be stopped by the police? What about if you are a person who comes from a war zone? Would you be happy if the police, National Border Guards, Regional State Administrative Agencies (AVI), Customs, Rescue Department, and City of Helsinki health inspectors stopped you?

Speaking for myself, I would not like to be stopped by the police even if I don’t have anything to hide. I lived in Argentina during the dirty war (1976-83), when over 30,000 people vanished thanks to state terrorism. I am still traumatized by those years.

I was alerted by a Migrant Tales reporter while at a meeting in Brussels. The whole operation clearly upset him like it must have many others.

Here is a question to the Helsinki police service: How many black police officials were present on Saturday? Were all the National Border Guards white? Were there any officials who were visible minorities who carried out the spot checks? Were there any Muslims among their ranks?

Modernizing the police service to represent as well the population of Helsinki would instill trust rather than erode it.

Read original tweets here. Continue reading “Migrant Tales’ response to the Helsinki police service’s actions at the Puhos shopping center”

Facebook Abdi Muhis: Sujuuko Puhoksen operaatio “kaikkien kaikkiaan rauhallisesti ja kaikkien osapuolten osalta erittäin hyvässä hengessä?”

Posted on by Migrant Tales

Poliisi väittää tiedotessa, että Puhoksen operaatio sujuu “kaiken kaikkiaan rauhallisesti ja kaikkien osapuolten osalta erittäin hyvässä hengessä.”

Abdi Muhis vastaa: 

Voit lukea alkuperänen juttu tässä.

Continue reading “Facebook Abdi Muhis: Sujuuko Puhoksen operaatio “kaikkien kaikkiaan rauhallisesti ja kaikkien osapuolten osalta erittäin hyvässä hengessä?””

UPDATE: Police were told that they cannot enter the mosque at the Puhos shopping center with a dog and shoes

Posted on by Migrant Tales

Were yesterday’s [Saturday’s] spot checks [at Puhos] necessary? Were they implemented with respect or to humiliate them?  

Abdi Muhis

Migrant Tales visited Sunday the Puhos shopping center of Eastern Helsinki and asked people, and business establishments after the police, National Border Guards, Regional Administrative Agencies (AVI), Customs, Rescue Department, and the City of Helsinki health inspectors carried out spot checks the previous day. 

The spot checks didn’t involve all business establishments at the Puhos shopping center but some.

A Somali called Appa, alleges and was surprised that the police with dogs tried to go to the mosque.

The police carrying out spot checks in a coffee shop next to the mosque.

“There were about 15 police and three dogs and we said they could not go to the mosque with dogs and shoes,” said Appa. “The police were disrespectful. I asked one policeman what he’s doing and he responded that ‘this is our country and can ask for your identification.'”

Appa said that everyone who came or went to the mosque was registered by the police.

Continue reading “UPDATE: Police were told that they cannot enter the mosque at the Puhos shopping center with a dog and shoes”

How the police, National Border Guards and white Finnish institutions keep visible migrants and minorities on a short leash

Posted on by Migrant Tales

What would you say if the police, the National Border Guards, Regional State Administrative Agencies (AVI), Customs, Rescue Department, and City of Helsinki health inspectors came knocking on your door on a Saturday afternoon? Such a thing happened yesterday at the Puhos shopping center of Easter Helsinki, where the majority of customers are visible migrants and minorities.

A Migrant Tales reporter, Muhammed Shire, who was at Puhos Saturday afternoon, asked one of the police why they didn’t carry out similar inspections of white Finns’ stores and stop their customers?

The police didn’t answer his question.

Even people coming out from a mosque were stopped and asked for identification.

Writes Shire in an email: “At the Rukous kerho (mosque), people can’t enter the premises or leave through the main entrance since the police carefully check everyone’s identity. At the main entrance, the police prohibited a young man from going in [the mosque] or leave and checked the person’s identity and registered it in the laptop. Other congregations in Finland don’t have to put up with these types of inspections in Finland.”

A very good question and we know the answer: Migrants, especially Muslims, are political cannon fodder for the government and a constant obsession about security marks these people and gives the police and authorities justification to get more funds.

 

The big question that emerges is if this operation by the police and other authorities is just another case of ethnic profiling.

 

The police and other officials like the Finnish Border Guards at Puhos on Saturday.  Photos by Muhammed Shire.

And why wouldn’t you believe that ethnic profiling was at play? Can we trust the police when it comes to relations with non-white Finns? Remember June when a secret Facebook page with over 2,800 members made openly racist comments about Muslims? That amounts to about one-third of Finland’s police service of 7,000, according to the Long Play scoop.

Read the full story here.

What about a year before that, in April, when the police and National Border Guard carried out spot checks on “foreign-looking” people? There’s also the Musta Barbaari case where his mother and sister were stopped by the police.

When was the last time you were stopped by the police?

Do the police ethnically profile people? I am pretty certain that you will get a candid answer from members of the Roma minority, who have lived in Finland for over 500 years.

As long as the police and other public officials continue to have obsolete and racist views of Others, the less migrants and minorities will trust the police and continue to see them as enemies.

One of the “short leashes” that officials use to keep migrants and minorities oppressed and treated like second-class citizens is ethnic profiling.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Police and other authorities carry out identification checks at the Puhos shopping center of Eastern Helsinki

Posted on by Migrant Tales

On Saturday about 3 pm, the police, the National Border Guards, Regional State Administrative Agencies (AVI), Customs, Rescue Department, and City of Helsinki health inspectors started to ask foreign-looking people for their identification in Puhos, a shopping center in Eastern Helsinki frequented by migrants. 

The big question that emerges is if this operation by the police and other authorities is just another case of ethnic profiling.

The police and other officials like the Finnish Border Guards at Puhos on Saturday.  Photos by Muhammed Shire.

“I asked a policeman [at Phos] why they are asking people for their identification and why they don’t ask those who go to shops run by white Finnish?” he queried, adding that the police said that “on a weekly basis they do these types of operations, but he wouldn’t say where.”¨

Migrant Tales will follow up on this story on Sunday.

 

Maria Lohela pats far right on the back because she is an Islamophobic populist

Posted on by Migrant Tales

Outgoing speaker of parliament and Blue Reform (formerly Perussuomalaiset)* MP, Maria Lohela, finds kind words for a far-right Turku municipal council politician called Olavi Mäenpää who died this week.

Olavi Mäenpää. Source: Facebook.
Read the original posting here.

Why would a politician like Lohela mention a politician who spreads racism and hatred of migrants and minorities?

The only answer I can find is that Lohela finds ideological solidarity with people who hate migrants and minorities.

What did she write about the late far-right city of Turku municipal politician?

“Olavi Mäenpää’s unconditional outspokeness was often puzzling, sometimes offensive. His politial message targetted people…In the same time, Mäenpää was for many locals’ and voters’ the only hope who dared to crack open and upset administration structures, old, unreasonable old good-time practices. It’s in this where he has merit. Mäenpää’s energy and insistance on detail were inexhaustible.”

Continue reading “Maria Lohela pats far right on the back because she is an Islamophobic populist”

QUOTE OF THE DAY: Silence is “approval” of racism

Posted on by Migrant Tales

“Silence is the first thing after hate that is dangerous…silence is not the answer, hate is not the answer.”

Holocaust survivor

If what the Holocaust survivor says is true, and there is no reason to believe that it isn’t true, there is widespread approval of racism in our society. I live in Finland, so the silence I hear is a pat on the back, support of racism.

Enrique Tessieri

Watch the full video here.

Racism is an ugly monster that can and must be slayed and banished from our society

Posted on by Migrant Tales

Do you remember five years ago a brave young fourteen-year-old called Rebecka Holm? A letter to the editor about the racist harassment she regularly endured when going to school changed her life

In March 2012, the Red Cross gave her an award for her bravery on the UN Day Against Racism.

I had the honor to interview Holm. She said that silence isn’t the answer when confronting a social ill like racism.

“If somebody speaks bad about you and wants to make you feel inferior because of your background,” she said, “then we need to talk about this serious matter and hide from it.”

Racism is too ugly to hide and happens a lot in Finland.

The bravery that the then young adolescent showed has more worth than many adults and politicians together, who approve racist harassment with their silence or use it as fuel to advance their political careers.

I will try to make contact with her and see what her thoughts are on the topic today.

Finland: Retreating into a shell and fuelling xenophobia and racism

Posted on by Migrant Tales

As Finland retreats deeper into its shell and ethnocentrism, it feeds the beast of xenophobia and racism. Apart from Perussuomalaiset (PS)* MP Laura Huhtasaari, who openly encourages direct violence and hatred against migrants and minorities, there are others that are just as guilty. 

Who are they?

Interior Minister Paula Risikko and former Interior Ministry official Päivi Nerg have warned us over and over how undocumented migrants threaten our security. If Risikko and Nerg told us with gusto about the threats, Prime Minister Juha Sipilä’s government has done little to nothing to challenge such xenophobic statements.

See the full tweet here.

Volker Türk, UNHCR assistant high commissioner for refugees, said last year that labelling refugees as security threats “risks opening the door to xenophobic and racist rhetoric and can even lead to physical attacks directed against refugees.”

Continue reading “Finland: Retreating into a shell and fuelling xenophobia and racism”

Laura Huhtsaari’s “new normal” is a synonym and carte blanche for open violence and hostility against migrants and minorities

Posted on by Migrant Tales

Perussuomalaiset (PS)* presidential contender and MP, Laura Huhtasaari, claimed in her speech Sunday that populism isn’t a passing phase but will become to “new normal.” In Huhtasaari’s and the PS’ violent world that targets migrants and minorities, the MP deceives the crowd by stating this “new normal” is a good matter.

The picture below that the MP with the kindergarten teacher smile should have shown when speaking to her followers of the PS and the “new normal” should show the picture below.

Read the full story here.

While Tony Blair is a disgraced politician who led his country into the Iraqi war in 2003 by lying, his think tank, the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change, lacks credibility. How can you trust a former prime minister that misled his country and the Western world with then US President George W. Bush into a disastrous war?

Continue reading “Laura Huhtsaari’s “new normal” is a synonym and carte blanche for open violence and hostility against migrants and minorities”