Finland: Emergency law to block people seeking asylum 'should never have passed'

In response to the Finnish Parliament’s approval of the emergency law on the so-called “instrumentalisation” of migration, Dinushika Dissanayake, Amnesty International's Deputy Europe Director, said:

“This law should never have passed. It gravely undermines access to asylum and the protection from refoulement in Finland. It not only endangers the rights of people seeking safety, but it will also lead to arbitrariness and violence at the border.

“This calls into question Finland’s commitment to the rule of law because European and international law is clear: the principle of non-refoulement must always be upheld and claims of serious human rights violations upon return must be examined, regardless of how people have reached the territory.

“This law is inconsistent with the newly approved EU crisis and force majeure regulation. It goes beyond all powers granted under EU law and we expect the European Commission to rigorously scrutinise its legality.”

Diminishing people’s right to seek asylum

The new emergency law defines the "instrumentalisation" of migration as actions by “states or other actors” to facilitate irregular migration movements into another country in an attempt to destabilise it. This law is part of a series of recent measures proposed by the Finnish government that curtail the rights of people seeking asylum and migrants, presented as a response to an increase in the number of people crossing into Finland from Russia to seek asylum since last September.

The Finnish law follows in the dangerous footsteps of Latvia, Lithuania and Poland where numerous policies and practices have been introduced in breach of human rights law in the name of tackling so-called “instrumentalisation” attempts since 2021.