Police to investigate comments made on Facebook by Finns Party councillor

Finns Party chairman Timo Soini says that the party member’s comments are disgusting and racist

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The Satakunta Police Department has launched an investigation into comments made on Facebook by a Köyliö councillor from the Finns Party.
      The crime designation is incitement against an ethnic group.
      A Moroccan-born pizzeria entrepreneur was shot and killed in Oulu on Saturday night.
     
On Sunday, a member of the Finns Party  and board member of the party's Satakunta district wrote on Facebook that the shooter should be given a medal, and that "there is already a war going on and in every war decorations are handed out".
      The writer of the comments Tommi Rautio is also a local councillor in the small municipality of Köyliö, having been elected on the Finns Party ticket in 2008.
      Timo Soini, Chairman of the Finns Party, has forefully condemned Rautio’s remarks.
      ”That kind of text is disgusting and even racist”, the late-edition tabloid Iltalehti quoted Soini as saying on Tuesday.
     
Soini said that Rautio is likely to be dismissed from the party.
      ”No one has told people to applaud killings. This is utterly shocking and inhuman”, Soini noted.
      According to Soini, the issue will be discussed at a meeting of the party board on March 3rd, after Rautio’s oral arguments have been heard first.
     
The apparent killer in the Oulu incident turned his gun on himself and died later in hospital.
      Initial investigations by police in Oulu have not thrown up any sign of a racist motive for the crime, nor any previous connection between the shooter - believed to have been a member of a criminal gang - and his victims.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Local pizzeria became murder scene in Oulu; gunman died of self-inflicted wounds on Sunday (20.2.2012)

See also:
  NEWS ANALYSIS - Violence professionals also endanger "civilians" (21.2.2012)
  Prosecutors examine city councillor´s comments as possible incitement against an ethnic group (17.6.2011)
  True Finns renounce racism, discrimination, and favouritism (26.5.2011)

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