Discrimination and racism see another day in Finland because justice moves at snail’s pace

At the end of last year, Rasoul Khorram, a naturalized Finn who has lived in this country for six years, tried without luck to open a bank account at the local Osuuspankki savings bank. Migrant Tales told Khorram to get in touch with the bank regional office and the non-discrimination ombudsman about the case.

After almost half a year, the situation is the same: No bank account for Khorram.

“This shows me that Finnish citizenship is only a piece of paper that doesn’t mean much [in these types of cases],” he said. “I don’t know what to do next. I’ll probably do nothing.”

Read the full story here.

One of the reasons why discrimination lives another day in Finland is because justice is slow and usually drags its feet when it comes to these types of cases.

Migrant Tales reported a year ago about a case where a white woman threw a bucket of water on two black women and a migrant. The victim reported the incident to the police. A year later, the prosecutor decided not to press charges and writes:

“I will not press charges because the suspected crime, when evaluated as a whole, should be seen as minor considering the harm it caused or the degree of guilt of the suspect that it reveals.”

This is what the victim wrote on her Facebook page a year ago:

This Facebook posting was reprinted by Migrant Tales with permission.

Taking into account the ordeal of being discriminated and insulted in a racist manner, it is incredible that justice in such cases takes such a long time to be handed out. It’s not only unfair to the victim but reveals a serious problem in the Finnish system and how it sees discrimination, racism, hate speech and hate crime.