Category Archives: Finland

Swedish police focus on Chinese ship after suspected undersea cable sabotage

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Investigators gather evidence at two Baltic sites while Danish navy is shadowing Chinese cargo ship

Swedish police investigating the believed sabotage of two fibre-optic undersea cables in the Baltic Sea have said a Chinese ship off the coast of Denmark was “of interest” as Danish officials said its navy was shadowing a Chinese-registered cargo ship.

The ship, identified by Denmark as the Yi Peng 3, passed the two cables on Sunday and Monday about the time it is believed they were severed in a suspected malicious attack. The ship has been shadowed by a Danish navy vessel since it was located in waters between Sweden and Denmark.

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We assume damage to Baltic Sea cables was sabotage, German minister says

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Boris Pistorius says ‘no one believes’ two undersea fibre-optic communications cables were cut accidentally

Germany has said it has to assume that damage to two undersea fibre-optic communication cables in the Baltic Sea since Sunday was an act of sabotage.

Two cables – one between Finland and Germany, the other between Sweden and Lithuania – were severed on Sunday and Monday, raising suspicions of a malicious attack, though authorities initially declined to speculate.

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Two telecoms cables in Baltic Sea severed, raising suspicions of sabotage

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Outages include 1,200km link between Germany and Finland and 218km cable between Lithuania and Sweden

Two undersea fibre-optic communications cables in the Baltic Sea, including one linking Finland and Germany, have been severed, raising suspicions of sabotage by bad actors.

The episode on Monday recalled other incidents in the same waterway that authorities have probed as potentially malicious, including damage to a gas pipeline and undersea cables last year and the 2022 explosions of the Nord Sea gas pipelines.

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Finnish fathers taking nearly double length of paternity leave since 2022 reform

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Dads say rule change granting both parents equal time off has helped build bond between children and fathers

Paternity leaves in Finland have nearly doubled in length after a 2022 reform of the parental leave system, the social benefits agency has said.

The change granted both parents equal amounts of leave for the first time: 160 days each of paid leave, to be used before the child turns two. Sixty-three of the days can be transferred to the other parent, if desired.

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Finland exports snow-saving mats to ski resorts hit by climate crisis

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Preserving previous year’s snow for start of season can combat increasingly unpredictable winters

Before the arrival of electric fridges and freezers, people across Finland would saw a block of ice from a river or lake before the spring thaw, thickly cover it in an insulating layer of sawdust and stack it in barns, pits or ice cellars to protect produce from the warm air of the summer months.

Amid global heating and increasingly unpredictable shorter winters, a modern twist on the traditional jään säilöminen (ice preservation) technique is now being touted as a way to save Europe’s struggling low- and medium-altitude ski resorts.

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Funding cuts could mean death of Sámi languages, say Indigenous parliaments

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Sweden and Finland plan to withdraw funding to safeguard nine languages defined as threatened by Unesco

The Indigenous parliaments of Sweden, Finland and Norway have warned that some Sámi languages could disappear if Stockholm and Helsinki press ahead with plans to withdraw funding that could hit a critical preservation body.

Sámi Giellagáldu was created to safeguard, promote and strengthen the use of the nine Sámi languages across the Nordics, including North Sámi, which is spoken by an estimated 20,000 people across Norway, Sweden and Finland and classified by Unesco as endangered, and the much smaller Pite Sámi and Ute Sámi, which have less than 50 speakers each.

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Anti-immigration mood sweeping EU threatens its new asylum strategy

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The bloc’s migration pact, finally agreed after a decade of talks, is already in peril as states outdo each other in efforts to get tough

In 2015, when more than 1.3 million people headed to Europe, mostly fleeing a brutal war in Syria, the response of Germany’s then chancellor, Angela Merkel, was to say “Wir schaffen das” (“We can manage this”), and open the country’s borders.

Less than a decade later, and faced with a flow of irregular arrivals less than 10% of what it was at the peak of the bloc’s migration crisis, EU capitals are increasingly saying, “No, we can’t”. Or, perhaps more accurately, “We won’t”.

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US, Canada and Finland form ‘Ice Pact’ to project influence into Arctic region

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Partnership could produce up to 90 icebreaker ships to counter Russian and Chinese inroads into region

Canada, the United States and Finland say a newly announced “Ice Pact” to build a fleet of polar icebreaker ships will challenge China’s control of the market as nations scramble for influence in the Arctic.

The deal, announced during the Nato summit in Washington, could see as many as 90 icebreaker ships produced by the three countries in the coming years.

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Book borrowed from Finnish library in 1939 returned 84 years late

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Copy of Arthur Conan Doyle’s Refugees was due to be returned to Helsinki’s central library month after USSR invaded Finland

A book borrowed from a Helsinki library has been returned – 84 years overdue.

A Finnish translation of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s historical novel Refugees was received by librarian Heini Strand on Monday at the main desk at the Helsinki Central Library Oodi.

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Ursula von der Leyen, Nicolas Schmit, Anders Vistisen and Sandro Gozi debate economy – as it happened

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European leaders participate in debate hosted by Bruegel and the Financial Times

Karl Nehammer, the Austrian chancellor, hosted the British prime minister, Rishi Sunak.

“The leaders committed to implementing stronger frameworks to deal with migration, and that new innovative solutions are crucial to this end,” Nehammer said.

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UK and Finland discuss further efforts to stop Russia’s shadow oil fleet

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Third parties could be required to do more to block tankers from operating in Baltic and the Channel

Britain and Finland are discussing plans to require third parties to do more to block the Russian shadow oil tanker fleet operating in the Baltic and the Channel, the Finnish foreign minister has said.

The waters around Finland act as a key choke point for the estimated 100 Russian-bought oil tankers that navigate the Baltic monthly using opaque ownership structures to carry 90m tonnes of oil.

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Finnish school shooting suspect motivated by bullying, police say

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A 12-year-old boy is alleged to have killed a fellow pupil and seriously injured two others at Viertola school in Vantaa

A 12-year-old boy suspected of shooting and killing a classmate and wounding two girls of the same age at a school in Finland said he had been motivated by bullying, police have said, as flags flew at half-mast across the country.

Finland was in mourning after the 12-year-old was alleged to have arrived at Viertola school in Vantaa, a city north of the capital, Helsinki, armed with a handgun on Tuesday morning.

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Finland school shooting: 12-year-old arrested after fellow pupil dies

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Two other children seriously injured in incident in Helsinki suburb described by minister as ‘horrifying’

A 12-year-old child has died and two others have been seriously wounded in a school shooting in Finland.

The suspect, a fellow pupil, ran off after the shooting but was later arrested, police said. He was holding a licensed handgun owned by a close relative and admitted carrying out the shooting in an initial interview, they added.

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Weather tracker: cyclone warning in Australia while Finland freezes in -16C lows

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Meanwhile, South Sudan has ordered schools to shut amid extreme heatwave

A cyclone warning has been issued in northern Australia for coastal communities from the island of Groote Eylandt to the Northern Territory/Queensland border. Tropical Cyclone Megan, which developed in the Gulf of Carpentaria on Saturday, has been declared a category 3 cyclone by the Australian Bureau of Meteorology. Megan is forecast to make landfall on Monday, but has already brought gale-force winds and heavy rainfall to some areas over the weekend. Groote Eylandt was cut off after more than 400mm of rain in just 24 hours on Sunday.

There is a chance that Megan could strengthen further into a category 4 storm before making landfall, with the potential for damaging wind gusts of up to 125km/h. Megan is the fifth named cyclone in Australian waters so far this season, which is below the average of about 10 by this stage of the year.

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Sweden will complete its ‘long farewell to neutrality’ with Nato accession

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For Swedes it means a dramatic change of national identity, while the alliance gets greater control of the Baltic Sea

Just a few short months ago, Sweden’s Nato membership seemed a very long way from being a done deal. Having submitted its application to join in May 2022 after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, it seemed at times as though Stockholm might be left hanging interminably. While Finland, which had applied to join the alliance at the same time as its neighbour, became a member at record speed last April, Sweden got stuck in a diplomatic quagmire.

Last summer a series of Qur’an burnings in Sweden inflamed ties with Turkey, making a “yes” from Ankara look unlikely and at times inconceivable. And as recently as September, Viktor Orbán’s government was embroiled in a public war of words with Sweden over criticism of Hungary’s democracy and teaching in Swedish schools. Late last month, after Turkey’s parliament had given Sweden the green light, the Hungarian prime minister was still pushing for negotiations in a public letter to his Swedish counterpart, Ulf Kristersson.

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Finland’s former PM to be new president after rival concedes

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Centre-right Alexander Stubb declares victory and is congratulated by Pekka Haavisto

Finland’s centre-right former prime minister Alexander Stubb will become the next president after winning an election runoff with rival Pekka Haavisto in the country’s most high-stakes presidential election in a generation.

Stubb, of the National Coalition party, declared victory on Sunday night and Haavisto, a former foreign minister and a member of the Green party running as an independent, congratulated him.

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Finnish presidential candidate surprised at renewed focus on his sexuality

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Pekka Haavisto says discussion about his being gay has increased since he made it through to the final round of voting

The Finnish presidential candidate Pekka Haavisto has questioned why his sexuality has come under such strong focus in the final days of campaigning before Sunday’s election as polls narrow with his rival, Alexander Stubb.

The 65-year-old former foreign minister, who if he wins would become Finland’s first Green and first gay president, said he had been surprised by the way his sexuality had become an issue of public interest in the second and final round.

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Not just luggage: Finnish airline invites passengers to weigh in for flights

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Finnair says trial is voluntary and will help estimate weight of planes’ cargo before takeoff

The words “overweight luggage” have the power to induce a whirlwind of stress and embarrassment for holidaymakers. But one airline is upping the stakes by inviting passengers to step on the scales too.

The Finnish airline Finnair started the voluntary weighing in policy at departure gates at Helsinki airport on Monday with the aim of enabling it to better estimate the weight of its planes’ cargo before takeoff.

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Centre-right party ahead in Finnish presidential election

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Liberal Green party is a close second and goes through to second round, while far-right Finns have been knocked out

Finland’s former prime minister Alexander Stubb and the country’s former foreign minister Pekka Haavisto have progressed through to the second round of the presidential elections, knocking out a rightwing populist candidate.

With all votes counted, Stubb, of the centre-right National Coalition party, had won 27.2% of votes, while the liberal candidate Haavisto, a member of the Green party who is running as an independent, had secured 25.8%, election officials said.

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Finland goes to the polls as border tensions with Russia rise

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All presidential candidates champion independence and country’s new role in Nato as relations with Moscow deteriorate

Finns headed to the polls on Sunday to elect a new president, an office whose importance has grown as tensions with neighbouring Russia have increased since the invasion of Ukraine.

While the president’s powers are limited, the head of state – who also acts as supreme commander of Finland’s armed forces – helps to direct foreign policy in collaboration with the government, meaning the changing geopolitical landscape in Europe will be the main concern for the winner.

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