Finland 2020

28/02/2020: The Turku Court of Appeal has dismissed all charges against the Iraqi twins accused of terrorism and war crimes. They had already been acquitted in May 2017 by the Pirkanmaa District Court. Arriving in Finland as asylum seekers in 2015, they were accused of participating in the Camp Speicher massacre in Tikrit, Iraq, in 2014 in which the Islamic State (IS) executed at least a thousand unarmed prisoners. The Court of Appeal unanimously rejected all charges given that the evidence to clearly establish the identification of the suspects with the culprits recorded in the images of the massacre was outdated and unconvincing. (Source)

26/03/2020: Due to the sanitary conditions inflicted by the COVID-19 pandemic, the Ministry for Foreign Affairs has temporarily suspended preparations for the repatriation of Finnish children from the al-Hol camp in Syria. Repatriation would now be impossible, as the borders in the area are closed and transport connections are disrupted. Two orphans have been repatriated from the camp so far yet it has been reported that there are about ten Finnish mothers and about thirty children in the Al-Hol camp. (Source)

02/04/2020: Despite the fears and concerns stirred by the repatriation policy of Finnish IS members hastily implemented by Finnish authorities since mid-December 2019, Supo reported in the Yearbook 2019 that Finns returning from the conflict zone in Syria will create direct and indirect security threats in the near future and even in the longer term. According to Supo, from the perspective of the development of violent extremism, the children of people who support terrorist activities, the “growing generation”, are also a cause for concern. Supo has previously warned about the terrorist threat in Finland posed by men who have served as fighters and their wives, the children’s mothers. Now Supo considers in his assessment that the return of children may also cause problems in the long term. Even though the Finnish Government made it clear that there is no obligation to assist adults who have voluntarily gone to the area and the return of children is now practically on hold, among other things due to the Covid situation, Supo asserts that people returning to Finland from Syria can destabilize the security situation elsewhere in Europe as well and that problems will arise if the children's adaptation to Finland fails. (Source)

13/05/2020: Gilles de Kerchove, EU Counter-Terrorism coordinator, announced that the pandemic period will certainly be conducive to new terrorist attacks carried out by reassured and emboldened fighters. The health sector of European countries, more vital than ever in the context of the spread of the coronavirus, has been mentioned as a very likely target of “Far-Right extremists and Jihadists”. (Source)

31/05/2020: Three Finnish Jihadist women from Espoo and Ostrobothnia detained in the al-Hol camp in Syria returned to Finland with their nine children via Türkiye, sparking fears and conspiracy theories among the local population, particularly among the Far-Right opposition. Indeed, the Finnish Constitution does not allow any ban on any Finnish nationals entering the territory, but in addition to the apprehension fueled by the return of individuals adhering to a Jihadist ideology, the questions relate in particular to the means of return to Finland used by the group of returnees. Some suppose that they would have benefited from undercover help from the Finnish authorities. (Source)

If the Ministry of Foreign Affairs denied any Government involvement in the exfiltration of these fighters from Syria/Türkiye to Finland, the Minister of Foreign Affairs Pekka Haavisto nevertheless affirmed that they had indeed benefited from such assistance. It is also expected that the Finnish authorities will take the necessary measures to ensure that the returnees do not resume their terrorist activities directly on Finnish territory. (Source)

Among the returnees is the wife of the infamous Portuguese Jihadist Nero Saraiva. She suddenly left Finland in 2012 and was happy with her life in the Caliphate before her internment in the al-Hol camp in Syria where there are still around twenty Finnish children and ten mothers. (Source)

The repatriation of Jihadists is a thorny question in Finland which stirs many fears. The latest returns of Jihadists have tarnished the image of Haavisto, who is exposed to criticism but also to possible legal proceedings for the blurry role played by his Ministry in these operations. The charges against him will be dropped on December 9, 2020 following the report published by the Constitutional Law Commission which confirmed that Haavisto had indeed violated the Law but not to the extent of crossing the red line required to be charged before the national Court. (Source)

13/06/2020: In the midst of the heated debate concerning the return of IS female adepts from Syria to Finland, Supo Chief, Antti Pelttari, stated at MTV that returnees pose a threat to national security and that a new intelligence legislation must be further adapted to the current needs, despite efforts recently made in this regard. Pelttari opinions coincide with assessments published in April 2020 expressing concerns towards the potential impact of returnees and their children on Finland security. According to him, the networks of IS returnees are deepening and radicalization in prison may be a long-term threat as well. Nonetheless, he assured that the last returnees are the subject of a preliminary investigation. (Source)

22/10/2020: A session in the Finnish Parliament was held on the subject of Islamist terrorism in response to the attacks in France. This underscored a clear inexperience and incomprehension of the Finnish authorities in this matter since for the Minister of the Interior Maria Ohisalo, terrorist acts are reduced to desperate outbursts from people marginalized by society. This repeated focus on marginalization portrays terrorists as desperados who, in one way or another, are coerced by society into committing terrorist attacks when they are, above all, conscious actors who firmly believe in their cause, hence their dangerousness. (Source)

03/11/2020: In reaction to the attacks in France, Finland has decided to increase police numbers to strengthen security for pre-emptive purposes although there is no clearly defined threat in the country at present. The cities expected to be subject to increased police surveillance have not been clearly listed. (Source)

In order to  stand up to terrorism threat in a collective way, Foreign Minister Pekka Haavisto called on European countries to reduce inequalities to prevent hotbeds of protest from igniting the continent for the benefit of terrorists. (Source)

Through the voice of its President, Sauli Niinistö, Finland is one of the very first countries to have stood united with France and expressed solidarity in the ordeal of terrorist attacks. (Source)

13/11/2020: In response to the terrorist attacks that crippled France and Austria, the European Interior Ministers published a Joint Declaration recalling European solidarity against terrorist threat and evoking new measures taken in the fight against terrorism notably the strengthening of the Schengen Area through the digital recording of entries and exits, and closer cooperation with third countries in order to combat terrorist threats. The digital domain was addressed in order to counter extremist propaganda in all its forms, the apology of violence and the financing of hatred and violent extremism. The strengthening of the external borders of the European Union was considered to protect against any intrusion by foreign fighters, in particular through the relevant functionalities of the Schengen Information System (SIS). (Source)

16/11/2020: In Finland, Major Anti Parronen declared, on the occasion of the publication of his study “Caravan's war path: perspectives on Djihadism” by the National Defense University, the need for Finland to break with its ignorance of the Jihadist phenomenon and to take the necessary measures to prepare for its possible future developments, in particular by investing more in research. 400 people are said to be targeted by anti-terrorism efforts in Finland and 80 Finns are said to have joined IS in the 2010s. Terrorist movements active in Finland are IS as well as Somali Shabaab and Kurdish radical groups. Only one Jihadist attack was committed in Finland itself in Turku in 2017 by a Moroccan national who attacked passers-by with knives. The country above all serves as a breeding ground for recruiters of Jihadist groups who carried out transfers of Finnish fighters to war zones in the Middle East or the Horn of Africa. (Source)

20/12/2020: Finland repatriated two families of Jihadists from the al-Hol camp in Syria, two women with six children, in accordance with its legal obligations towards its citizens. However, the two women are considered radicalized sympathizers of the Islamic State constituting a “threat to security” according to the Finnish police. One of them has written comments on Twitter supporting IS ideology. Given that it is not possible to separate children from their parents, Finland has no choice but to deal with these radicalized elements in its repatriation policy, especially since some Jihadists refuse to return home and sentence their children to remain in Syria in dire conditions. The repatriation operation was carried out in cooperation with Germany, which repatriated three women and twelve children. (Source)

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