More than 200 researchers from different universities in Finland and abroad have signed a petition calling on Parliament's administration committee to reject a controversial deportation bill.
If passed into law, the legislation would allow Finnish border authorities to refuse to accept asylum applications in certain circumstances. The bill is seen as a response to Russia's use of so-called 'instrumentalised migration' — the deliberate funnelling of asylum seekers to Finland's border checkpoints.
The petition was launched by Lena Näre, a professor of sociology at the University of Helsinki, and Markus Jäntti, an economics professor at the University of Stockholm.
It states that Prime Minister Petteri Orpo's (NCP) government has failed to prove that an increase in the number of asylum seekers arriving at Finnish border crossings would represent a security threat to Finland.
The petition further notes that the number of people seeking asylum in Finland last year was within normal levels.
The so-called deportation law — which has also been labelled the "turnback" law — has raised much criticism and controversy, especially as bringing it into force would contravene the Finnish constitution as well as a number of international treaties Finland has signed up to.
The Council of Europe's Commissioner for Human Rights, Michael O'Flaherty, said the draft bill "raises a number of significant human rights concerns" and called on Finland to reject it.
The bill is set to be further discussed within Parliament's administration committee on Monday. In order to pass into law, it would require a five-sixths majority in Parliament — meaning the government would need support from opposition parties to get the bill over the line.
