A large proportion of Finnish police consider the asylum-seeker crisis’ effects in Finland to constitute a threat to the country’s security, a poll by regional news conglomerate Lännen Media shows.
Every third Finnish police officer replied to the survey, and four out of five respondents said they consider the steep rise in immigration a threat. The attitude is especially high among younger police officers.
At the same time a majority of police say they also consider so-called street patrols a factor that increases unrest.
A third of police polled say that the government’s immigration policies have backfired badly over the past year. Only a fifth of respondents say they consider the government’s immigration policies reasonably good.
The main reasoning for the positions given was that not all people entering the country can have their backgrounds or identities verified. Some of the police polled say they believe there to be radical IS fighters among the asylum-seekers arriving in Finland.
The survey was conducted by Lännen Media together with the Finnish Police Federation. A total of 2,489 police officers responded to the poll.