Minister of the Interior Petteri Orpo says that the Finnish Immigration Service (Migri) and police are preparing to close down some reception centres for asylum seekers. Orpo told Yle on Friday that the existing centres have not always been located in the right places as the number of asylum seekers has grown quickly.
"Together with the police and Migri, we are now going over the locations of all the centres. Actually we already know that we will close the centres that are judged to be in the wrong places from the standpoint of security – for instance, too far away in terms of police operations," Orpo said.
There are now more than 120 centres, about 100 of them opened hurriedly this autumn since a sudden surge in the number of people arriving in the country seeking asylum.
Praise for police action in Raisio
The minister also commented on Friday's news that authorities in Raisio near Turku had arrested a 19-year-old asylum seeker on suspicion of rape and aggravated sexual abuse of a 14-year-old girl on Tuesday. According to Orpo, the only good part of the Raisio case is that police acted quickly and that the suspect was taken into custody immediately. That case followed a similar one the previous day in Kempele, near Oulu.
28.11: An earlier version of this piece mistakenly said that Kempele was near Turku. This has been corrected to Oulu.