Tag Archives: Finland

Russia tops agenda for White House visit by Nordic leaders

President Obama and Nordic Leaders

By Roberta Rampton

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The leaders of Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Norway and Iceland will be treated to the pomp of a White House state visit on Friday, a summit where Russia’s military aggression will top the agenda.

President Barack Obama will welcome the leaders for talks focused on pressing global security issues, including the crisis in Syria and Iraq that has led to a flood to migrants in Europe.

Moscow’s annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea region in 2014 alarmed Russia’s Nordic and Baltic neighbors. With NATO considering ways to try to deter further Russian aggression, the White House wants to show support for its northern European allies.

“It is a way of sending a signal that the United States is deeply engaged when it comes to the security of the region, and we will be actively discussing what steps we can collectively take to improve the situation,” said Charles Kupchan, Obama’s senior director for European affairs.

Kupchan declined comment on specific measures the White House hopes to emerge from the summit.

Obama will be limited in what he can promise by the political calendar, given that his second and final term ends next year on Jan. 20. Americans are set to hold presidential elections on Nov. 8.

The visit will culminate in a star-studded state dinner in a tent with a transparent ceiling, with lighting, flowers and ice sculptures evoking the northern lights.

Pop star Demi Lovato, known for her support of liberal causes, will perform after guests enjoy a main course of ahi tuna, tomato tartare, and red wine braised beef short ribs.

Obama is expected to laud the humanitarian and environmental accomplishments of his guest nations, who have been key supporters of an international deal to curb climate change that the White House sees as a key part of Obama’s legacy.

“The president has often said, ‘Why can’t all countries be like the Nordic countries?'” Kupchan said.

(Reporting by Roberta Rampton)

Not in my backyard? Mainstream Scandinavia warily eyes record immigration

OSLO-STOCKHOLM (Reuters) – Norwegian officials called the school guards “extra supervision”. Critics said the plan to post security personnel near an Oslo school in case of assaults by newly arrived refugees was an ugly euphemism for intolerance.

Across the border in the far northern Swedish town of Kalix, a traditional bastion of center-left politics, over 100 residents signed a petition against plans to turn a 19th century country house into a reception center for unaccompanied minors.

The debate among these liberal Scandinavian stalwarts would have been unheard of a year ago, underscoring how concern about a record influx of immigrants is percolating into the Nordics’ mainstream from the populist fringes.

Anti-immigrant, populist parties have gained support since some 250,000 refugees entered the Nordics last year. A record 163,000 refugees arrived in Sweden and the far right is vying for top spot in polls. In Denmark, the anti-immigration Danish People’s Party is the second largest in parliament.

But it is a backlash among the mainstream that may be the biggest change. There are signs that voters may be broadly supportive of immigrants but not in their own backyard. From welfare cuts to new ID checks, it is a trend that shows the limits of even some of Europe’s most open societies, and may represent a sea change for politics in Scandinavia.

“It’s a big change happening close to us. In all neighborhoods there are concerns,” said Pia Almvang, head of the parents’ association at Lysaker primary school in a leafy well-to-do area of villas near Oslo, cut through by a motorway with cheaper four-storey blocks of flats built alongside.

“The parents just want to look after their kids.”

The town council agreed to parents’ requests for extra security by a motorway underpass near a refugee center for 600 people that opened this month. After criticisms of “asylum guards” the proposal was withdrawn, but it had already polarized this middle class community.

A February survey showed immigration as the main concern for 40 percent of Swedes, easily trumping worries over failing schools, joblessness and welfare. The change over half a year was the biggest opinion swing in the poll’s history.

From taking in Vietnam draft dodgers in the 1960s to Balkans war refugees in the 1990s, Sweden has been proud of its open door policy for decades. Norway has been among the leaders in helping refugees worldwide with aid.

While the asylum situation has led to an outpouring of support from many Swedes – charities reported record donations last year – it has also led others to worry about the effect on schools, crime and the country’s welfare state.

TENSION AT HOME

In Kalix, hit by a decline in the paper industry but still a bastion of Social Democrat support, residents have petitioned the council to abandon plans for a center for around 30 unaccompanied children.

“I have a big heart and I believe we have to help, so it’s not about that, but enough is enough,” said Anne-Maj Ostlund, a 75-year-old retired school teacher who lives close to the yellow-painted wooden villa in Kalix, being used as a hostel

“I have lived in heaven here … it is peaceful,” said Ostlund, who has lived in the same house since 1948. “What is going to be left?”

Middle class neighborhoods in Stockholm and Gothenburg have seen meetings where furious citizens have questioned politicians over refugees’ housing.

Police were called to one meeting in Haninge, near Stockholm, where the local authority had gathered residents and parents of pupils at a nearby school to inform them about plans for a center for unaccompanied minors.

Council workers were met by shouts of “they are going to rape our children,” and “who will take responsibility when someone dies”.

Mainstream parties in Sweden are now proposing measures against immigration that were only the ground of the far right a few years ago. Prime Minister Stefan Lofven, who once told crowds that “My Europe does not build walls”, tightened asylum rules and border controls with ID checks.

In Denmark a bill tightening immigration laws, including the confiscation of refugees’ valuables, passed with overwhelming support including the center-left Social Democrats.

Sweden’s Moderate Party, the biggest of the center-right opposition, wants to limit asylum seekers’ access to welfare.

It was a sign of the times that when Sweden’s center left interior minister said the government would deport 80,000 immigrants this year, former Foreign Minister Carl Bildt tweeted the “probable aim is to send a signal that new ones are not welcome.”

The concerns are not just related to security but that the Nordic state is under threat from the high fiscal cost of newcomers and the sense that civic trust which underpins a culture of high taxes is being eroded.

Nordic nations have the highest percentage of people agreeing that “most people can be trusted” when asked in international surveys, helping drive a consensus for high taxes and extensive welfare.

“The Nordic welfare state works due to trust. You have to trust that people work and pay taxes when they are able to do so,” said Gert Tinggaard, professor of political science at Denmark’s Aarhus University.

“The second condition is that you also have to trust the politicians,” he added. “You get a bang for your buck.”

The IMF estimates that Sweden will spend 1.0 percent of its gross domestic product on asylum seekers in 2016, by far the highest of 19 European nations surveyed.

Last year, Sweden had to find an extra 70,000 school places due to asylum seekers, on top of 100,000 pupils that normally enter the school system for the first time in any given year.

In a country where speaking out against immigration is still taboo for many, Scandinavians privately voice concerns about signs of crowded emergency rooms and larger school classes. Newspapers are increasingly full of reports of money being spent on refugees and reports of crime involving asylum seekers, although crime figures do not bear out these concerns.

Lofven – who admits Sweden faces increased polarization – has seen his government’s support fall to record lows in polls due to a sense his government is helpless to stop a migrant influx.

For Ylva Johansson, Swedish minister for employment and integration issues, the problem is that thousands of refugees, many young men, are not integrated into the workforce, instead languishing in asylum centers in villages and towns.

“Most Swedes are not racist,” she said. “But when there is this special asylum housing when they cannot work, and cannot be part of society this is really a tension.

“This is a dangerous situation,” she added. “We have a lot of people in no man’s land .. living outside society.”

(Additional reporting by Daniel Dickson and Johan Ahlander in Stockholm, Sabina Zawadzki in Copenhagen; Writing by Alistair Scrutton; Editing by Janet McBride)

Thousands of Iraqi refugees leave Finland voluntarily

HELSINKI (Reuters) – Thousands of Iraqi refugees who arrived in Finland last year have decided to cancel their asylum applications and to return home voluntarily, citing family issues and disappointment with life in the frosty Nordic country.

Europe is in the grip of its worst migrant crisis since World War Two, with more than a million people arriving last year, fleeing wars and poverty in the Middle East and beyond.

Germany and Finland’s neighbor Sweden have taken in many of the migrants but Finland too saw the number of asylum seekers increase nearly tenfold in 2015 to 32,500 from 3,600 in 2014.

Almost two thirds of the asylum seekers last year were young Iraqi men, but some are now having second thoughts, so Finland will begin chartering flights to Baghdad from next week to take them home.

Officials said about 4,100 asylum seekers had so far canceled their applications and that number was likely to reach 5,000 in the coming months.

“My baby boy is sick, I need to get back home,” said Alsaedi Hussein, buying a flight back to Baghdad at a small travel agency in Helsinki.

Somalia-born Muhiadin Hassan who runs the travel agency said he was now selling 15 to 20 flights to Baghdad every day.

“It’s been busy here for the past few months,” he said.

A majority of the home-bound migrants have told immigration services they want to return to their families, but some expressed disappointment with life in Finland.

“Some say the conditions in Finland and the lengthy asylum process did not meet their expectations, or what they had been told by the people they paid for their travel,” said Tobias van Treeck, program officer at the International Organization for Migration (IOM).

“TOO COLD”

Echoing that comment, travel agent Hassan said: “Some say they don’t like the food here, it’s too cold or they don’t feel welcome in Finland. There are many reasons.”

Nearly 80 percent of the migrants returning home are Iraqis. Just 22 of the 877 Syrians – whose country is racked by civil war – and 35 of the 5,214 Afghans who sought asylum in Finland last year have asked to return to their home country.

Along with other Nordic states, Finland has recently tightened its immigration policies, for example requiring working-age asylum seekers to do some unpaid work.

Hostility to migrants has also increased in Finland, a country with little experience of mass immigration and which now has economic problems.

Germany too, which took in 1.1 million people in 2015, has seen small numbers of Iraqi refugees choosing to go home.

Finland had been preparing to reject up to 20,000 asylum seekers from 2015, but the number of voluntary returnees could significantly reduce that figure.

“The number of returnees is increasing steadily … All asylum seekers are informed about the options for voluntary return and about the available financial assistance,” said Paivi Nerg, a senior official in the Finnish interior ministry.

However, most Iraqi returnees pay for their own flight home or seek help from Iraq’s embassy in Helsinki, she added.

Last year the Finnish government and the IOM provided financial help to 631 returnees and a similar number is expected this year.

The charter flights will carry up to 100 passengers back to Baghdad from Helsinki every week for as long as demand lasts, officials said.

(Editing by Jussi Rosendahl and Gareth Jones)

Anti-immigrant ‘Soldiers of Odin’ raise concern in Finland

HELSINKI (Reuters) – Wearing black jackets adorned with a symbol of a Viking and the Finnish flag, the “Soldiers of Odin” have surfaced as self-proclaimed patriots patrolling the streets to protect native Finns from immigrants, worrying the government and police.

On the northern fringes of Europe, Finland has little history of welcoming large numbers of refugees, unlike neighbouring Sweden. But as with other European countries, it is now struggling with a huge increase in asylum seekers and the authorities are wary of any anti-immigrant vigilantism.

A group of young men founded Soldiers of Odin, named after a Norse god, late last year in the northern town of Kemi. This lies near the border community of Tornio, which has become an entry point for migrants arriving from Sweden.

Since then the group has expanded to other towns, with members stating they want to serve as eyes and ears for the police who they say are struggling to fulfil their duties.

Members blame “Islamist intruders” for what they believe is an increase in crime and they have carried placards at demonstrations with slogans such as “Migrants not welcome”.

While most Finns disapprove of the group, its growth signals disquiet in a country strained by the cost of receiving the asylum seekers while mired in a three-year-old recession that has forced state spending and welfare cuts.

Finnish police have also reported harassment of women by “men with a foreign background” at New Year celebrations in Helsinki, as well as at some public events last autumn.

This followed complaints of hundreds of sexual assaults on women in Cologne and other German cities – with investigations focused on illegal migrants and asylum seekers – and allegations that Swedish police covered up accusations of similar assaults by mostly migrant youths in Stockholm.

Police files show reported cases of sexual harassment in Finland almost doubled to 147 in the last four months of 2015 from 75 in the same period a year earlier. The figures give no ethnic breakdown of the alleged perpetrators.

NO PLACE FOR VIGILANTES

The government has made clear there can be no place for vigilantes. “As a matter of principle, police are responsible for law and order in the country,” Prime Minister Juha Sipila told public broadcaster YLE on Tuesday, responding to concerns about the group. “Civilian patrols cannot assume the authority of the police.”

Finland received about 32,000 asylum seekers last year, a leap from 3,600 in 2014. Yet it has a relatively small immigrant community, with only around 6 percent of the population foreign-born in 2014 compared with a European Union average of 10 percent.

In Kemi, the Soldiers of Odin patrol the streets daily despite the temperatures sinking to -30 Celsius (-22 Fahrenheit). The group has stated it operates in 23 towns, but police says the network operates in five. Its Facebook page has 7,600 “likes”.

“In our opinion, Islamist intruders cause insecurity and increase crime,” the group says on its website. One self-proclaimed member, aiming to recruit new members in the eastern town of Joensuu, said on Facebook the group is “a patriotic organisation that fights for a white Finland”.

In the eastern German city of Leipzig, more than 200 masked right-wing supporters, carrying placards with racist overtones, went on a rampage this week.

Last October, a masked swordsman in Sweden killed two people with immigrant backgrounds in a school attack that fuelled fears that the refugee influx is polarising public opinion.

In Finland, no clashes have been reported between the Soldiers of Odin patrols and immigrants but police said they are keeping a close eye on the group. The Security Intelligence Service has said “some patrol groups” seem to have links to extremist movements.

LET THE POLICE DO THEIR JOB

Police acknowledge patrolling alone is not a crime. “As long as the patrols only report possible incidents to police, they have the right to do so,” said Kemi police Chief Inspector Eero Vanska. However, he added: “They should let the police do their job.”

Some Soldiers of Odin members play down the group’s motives, saying it aims to help people regardless of their skin colour. The group has closed its website following reports on some members’ criminal background. Members contacted by Reuters declined to comment.

But one of the group’s founders in Kemi, Mika Ranta, made clear immigration was the focus.

“We woke up to a situation where different cultures met. It caused fear and concern in the community,” he told a local newspaper in October. “The biggest issue was when we learned from Facebook that new asylum seekers were hanging around primary schools, taking pictures of young girls.”

Vanska said some asylum seekers had been seen near schools with phones. But he added that these reports could be simple misunderstandings and there was no concrete evidence to support the accusations.

The coalition government – which includes The Finns, an anti-immigration party – has criticised the patrols.

“These kinds of patrol clearly have anti-immigration and racist attributes and their action does not improve security,” interior minister Petteri Orpo told Reuters. “Now the police must commit its scarce resources to (monitoring) their action.”

But the government faces pressure to clamp down more on asylum seekers. Support for The Finns party, which joined the coalition in May, has plummeted partly because voters are frustrated with the government’s handling of migrants.

The government has tightened immigration policies, requiring working-age asylum seekers to do some unpaid jobs and acknowledge a “national curriculum” on Finnish culture and society.

The patrols have also prompted a counter-movement, with Facebook communities hoping to avert confrontations on the streets. One such is the Sisters of Kyllikki, named after a character in the national epic poem Kalevala.

“Our aim is to help people and to build up dialogue with all Finns as well as with immigrants,” said Niina Ruuska, a founder of the group which has about 1,500 Facebook members.

(Editing by Alistair Scrutton and David Stamp)