Asylum seekers “exploited” for political agenda, last August’s terror attack in Finland thoughts

As many of you know, the Finnish city of Turku had its first Islamic terror attack that could be well characterized as a lone wolf stabbing attack performed by an asylum seeker from Morocco. Before his expression of despair, hate or malcontent, according to the German newspapers, this purported youth criminal had sought asylum earlier in Germany and had used a false identity which seems to be the modus operandi for many young adults trying to claim to be underage asylum seekers.

The question is, was this unavoidable or is it part of daily life in Europe. We already have had school shootings. A day earlier, on the 17th of August, other Moroccan extremists drove into crowd in Las Ramblas in Barcelona. The shock of the previous attack hadn’t even faded. The anti-immigration crowd had its “told you so” watershed moment. In the earliest statements made by the prime minister Juha Sipilä, he had assured that this stabbing spree didn’t seem to be “terrorism” until the facts came pouring in. After the facts became obvious, a great number of politician and officials, who had been downplaying any Islamic terror threats, were quick to call for a sped-up process to approve a mass-surveillance of Finnish citizenry. Luckily, as sentiments chilled a bit, more sane voices have appeared to quell the rage to speed up the mass-surveillance intelligence bill, since the only argument the bill supporters could come up with is that every other nation has this kind of capability and we want it. Yet it comes to show that any kind of mass surveillance hasn’t prevented terror attacks in Europe.

Anyway, as the dust has settled, the police, that had in early panic arrested a bunch of young Moroccan men who had some kind of criminal record, is left with the stabber, a denied asylum seeker Abderrahman Mechkah, real name Abderrahman Bouanane. Since we have learned that the police had been tipped about the perpetrator already in January. The security police (SUPO) in charge of intelligence gathering and therefore anti-terrorism replied that it had overlooked the tip due to excessive workload because they get too many tips of potential Islamic terror. In hindsight, the signs were clear and the security police was unable to protect the citizenry and this attack wasn’t a spontaneous move that would’ve been unforeseeable. The security police had earlier this summer bumped up the security level up a notch and had taken measures to prevent a plot targeting a popular tourist attraction. To cover up their mishap, the security police gave statement that the perpetrator had been radicalized in the month of August even though some layman could’ve seen the signs already in January as Bouanane had shown sympathy to hardcore extremist sermons. Maybe this is very common among young asylum seekers and not therefore a veritable concrete evidence needed by the police to act upon. The officials have as well reported to have found a written manifesto by Bouanane, the content of which is so far undisclosed to the public but it is seen as the main lead in the investigation.

The bottom line so far. The stabbing attack made by a single knife wielding young denied asylum seeker killed two and injured 8 on Friday the 18th 2017 in Turku. The method and context would imply to Islamic terrorism yet no definitive evidence has been disclosed. The perpetrator was known to the officials even though he had used fake identity. Many politicians and officials hope for an accelerated revision of intelligence bill granting some form of mass surveillance capabilities even though the police already has extensive powers to surveil suspects under court order.

I hope to give a quick glance to the immediate reaction of this attack in Finland. I found out that the media, officials and politician were more sensitive as to what was being said online and what people thought than to prevent what had happened from happening again. The social media was indeed fuming and anti-immigration mood swooped the nation so to speak. Hate speech was all over the place and we can expect the need for censorship to rise to quell the so called hate speech. Since the attack the public opinion has turned more anti-immigrant and some politicians even advocate detaining centres for the deported and denied asylum seekers. It is however unlikely that the terror attack would affect the political ecosystem of the nation since most of the political parties have cemented support for Pro-EU and immigration stances despite all what’s happened. I hope that this tragic attack won’t serve as a pretext to pass the mass surveillance law that most likely would target the majority of the population.

• Image is a screen capture that shows to local media headlines. The first one is about the tip received from an asylum center. The comment is made by an officer in the security police. In quotes it says: "Glorifying a terrorist organization is not a crime." The latter claims that liking and spreading a hateful social media post could be a crime.