Finnish MP fined for anti-Muslim agitation on Facebook

Lawmaker Teuvo Hakkarainen was fined on Wednesday for a Facebook post calling for a Muslim-free Finland

Lawmaker Teuvo Hakkarainen from the nationalist Finns party was fined on Wednesday for a Facebook post calling for a Muslim-free Finland which a district court said amounted to agitation against an ethnic group.

Hakkarainen, whose party is part of the country's coalition government, made the call in a comment on the truck attack in France last July that killed 86 people. Prosecutors said the Tunisian-born driver had radical extremist views.



"All Muslims are not terrorists but all terrorists are Muslims," the parliamentarian wrote in the comment.

Central Finland's district court in Jyvaskyla imposed a 1,160 euro ($1,210) fine for Hakkarainen, who accepted the verdict. Local media quoted his assistant telling the court that the lawmaker was not aware of the legislation in question.

The Finns party said it would next month discuss possible political sanctions for him. The party, previously known as True Finns, is known for its eurosceptic and nationalist views, but it has toned down its demands after joining Finland's three-party government in 2015.



Finland has tightened its immigration policies, along with other Nordic countries, after about 32,000 migrants and refugees arrived in the country in 2015.

Thousands of people rallied against ethnic hatred in Helsinki that year after another Finns parliamentarian called in a Facebook post for a fight against multiculturalism.