Thors: Deliberate deception in immigration debate

President Halonen says deportation of grandmothers violates sense of justice

Astrid Thors

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Finland’s Minister of Migration and European Affairs Astrid Thors (Swedish People’s Party) says that politicians in Finland are making misleading statements about dealing with immigration issues.
      “Many politicians taking part in the debate have given erroneous impressions on what we politicians can do.... Mobility has increased and we are committed to international obligations in our policy on asylum seekers”, Thors says.
      “One must not give the wrong picture of what the possibilities and obligations of politics are. By giving the wrong impression, a politician misrepresents the debate, and this kind of thing has happened."
      Thors does not mention any names.
     
Astrid Thors hopes that the government and the entire political system would be vigilant if there are continued assaults against people’s freedom of expression on the immigration issue.
      In the view of Thors, politicians should have zero-tolerance against attempts to intimidate anyone into silence.
      Thors is pleased that her ministerial colleague, Minister for Foreign Affairs Alexander Stubb (Nat. Coalition Party), took a stand on the immigration issue in Sunday’s Helsingin Sanomat, giving his support to Thors, who has been threatened in various online debates.
      “Stubb wants to debate the right issues with the right terminology. Hopefully the entire National Coalition Party is behind him.”
     
Support from other ministers and politicians has been less generous, including that from Prime Minister Matti Vanhanen (Centre).
      However, on Sunday, Prime Minister Vanhanen said unequivocally that Thors has the backing of the whole government.
      In a monthly radio interview programme, Vanhanen also emphasised that Finland needs to adopt a stance of zero-tolerance toward racism, saying that candidates in the coming elections should not pander to racist attitudes “even between the lines”.
     
Thors says that she is disappointed with the quality of public debate on immigration.
      “I have been very upset that in the debate, immigrant families are pitted against Finnish pensioners, for instance. There is a deliberate attempt to seek out analogies to make extreme points of view.”
     
President Tarja Halonen, meanwhile, feels that the decisions to deport two grandmothers, one Egyptian and one Russian, go against a general sense of fairness.
      In an interview with the Finnish News Agency STT on Friday, Halonen conceded that officials have acted in accordance with existing legislation.
      She nevertheless added: “But these decisions do not sit very well with my own sense of justice, and on the basis of feedback, they are hard to reconcile with the sense of justice of the Finnish people. The decisions seem unreasonable, considering the predicament that the grandmothers are in”, Halonen said.
      Minister of Justice Tuija Brax (Green) welcomed Halonen’s comments.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Immigration experts face racist harassment (16.3.2010)
  Foreign Minister Stubb defends immigration and multiculturalism (19.3.2010)
  NEWS ANALYSIS: Death threats have become an everyday phenomenon (3.3.2010)
  Police investigate Facebook group about Finnish minister as unlawful intimidation (1.3.2010)

Helsingin Sanomat