Estonia's Other Statue

Everyone knows about the Soviet 'Bronze Soldier' memorial that was moved in Tallinn a while back. This was a memorial erected in Estonia's Capital by the Soviet Union to remember the Soviet soldiers who died during fighting to take the Estonian State from the Nazis (for incorporation into Stalin's Soviet Union).

Of course, idiotic Russians claim that the memorial is to honor those who 'liberated' Estonia from the Nazis. One could say that the Soviet Union did do that. The only problem was that the Soviets then failed to give the Estonians their country back.

However, you have probably never heard about this other memorial located in Tallinn, which also happened to be unceremoniously removed. This would be:

The Memorial for Teachers and Students Perished
during the War of Independence

A sculpture commemorating the teachers and students who gave their lives in the War of Independence. This was one of the first monuments that the Soviets removed after occupying Estonia in 1940. Students of Tallinn kept honoring it by laying flowers where it had stood. Many of these students were arrested and never seen again. All monuments honoring the heroes of the War of Independence were either destroyed or removed by the Soviets. This particular one was returned to its place of honor in a slightly damaged condition after the end of the first Soviet occupation. It was again removed immediately after the Soviet invasion in 1944. - ESTONIA, A Nation Unconquered, by Aarand Roos

The statue in the photo is not the original one. That one was destroyed by the Soviets. This one was rebuilt in the 1990's after they finally managed to take back their freedom from Soviet domination.

P.S.

All this happened well after the 1920 Peace Treaty signed between Russia and Estonia, which included the following statement:

Article II

In consequence of the right of all peoples to self-determination, to the point of seceding completely from the State of which they form part, a right proclaimed by the Socialist and Federal Russian Republic of the Soviets, Russia unreservedly recognises the independence and sovereignty of the State of Estonia, and renounces voluntarily and for ever all sovereign rights possessed by Russia over the Estonian people and territory whether these rights be based on the juridical position that formerly existed in public law, or in the international treaties which, in the sense here indicated, lose their validity in future. - Treaty of Tartu

The Estonians would be good to demand that Russia re-confirm their intent to honor this Treaty, for whatever good it will do. With that, this whole issue is another reminder that Russia has yet to go through an accounting of the Crimes of the Soviet Union like Nazi Germany went through.

Previous:
Russian Actions against Estonia a Reminder that the Crimes of Communism Still Need to be Investigated

Europe's Lingering Scar of Communism

Link:
They were Soviets, right? - CDR Salamander which has the following joke:

Reminds me of the one Estonian joke I know. In the 1980s DC you head into a bar and sit next to some drunk old man with a funny accent. You strike up a conversation, note his accent, and ask him where he is from. He stands up straight and says;

I am from Estonia; the world's most powerful nation!

Funny, you think to yourself - never heard of it. He continues;

Our government is in North America, our land is in Europe and most of our population is in Siberia!

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Remembering the Soviet Union v.1
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Total BS: "The Internet Could have Stopped Hitler"

Here is a recent story about how the internet could have possibly stopped Hitler had it been around in the 1930's/1940's:

STOCKHOLM, Sweden - The spread of information on the Internet has given the world a new tool to forestall conflicts, Nobel literature prize winner Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clezio said Sunday.

In his Nobel lecture to the Swedish Academy, the 68-year-old Frenchman said an earlier introduction of information technology could even have prevented World War II.

"Who knows, if the Internet had existed at the time, perhaps Hitler's criminal plot would not have succeeded — ridicule might have prevented it from ever seeing the light of day," he said. - Daily News

What a load of crap. If there is a shred of truth to this theory, then why is it that the internet has failed to stop:

• - Iran's nuclear program and support of terrorists.
  
• - North Korea's communist government
• - Zimbabwe's criminal government
• - Cuba's communist government
• - Genocide happening a couple of times/places in Africa
• - Russia's aggressive actions in Europe
• - Saddam's Iraq

Not only that, but it seems that the internet has kept alive lies that have been disproved over and over, such as those surrounding the 9/11 attacks, those suggesting that Saddam had no WMD, and so on. The internet has also failed to overcome mainstream media's decision to ignore certain news items, such as unflattering news about President-elect Obama whether true or not. Only these day you can find such news if you bother to go and look for it. That at least is a good start.

Adding to the limited benefits of the internet to stop wars, oppressive countries filter their citizen's access to the internet. Worse, these regimes can use the internet as one more way to spread their propaganda. When all else fails, they can simply do a denial of service attack, as Russia did against Estonia and Georgia in recent years. During the Soviet Soldier statue conflict in Estonia, it was impossible to get access to any Embassy of Estonia website as they were all under a denial of service attack.

(Washington, DC)

It has also failed to stop misguided or plain simply bad/disingenuous information such as truly bad misinformation on firearms and the completely useless 'assault weapon' ban that there is now talk of reinstating, even though there is no 'assault weapon' crime to warrant a new 'ban' and especially considering that the weapons will remain available in slightly different form in order to continue to be sold under a ban. It is just liberal feel-good legislation.

It is not the internet that stops bad things from happening. It is people of honor and will.

Link:

Could the Internet have stopped Hitler? French novelist Le Clezio says yes - NY Daily News

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Putin's Inconvenient Memorial

Remember Russia's fury over Estonia's decision that they no longer wanted to have a Soviet-placed statue as a reminder of Soviet oppression and occupation in the middle of their Capital and moved it without asking for Russian permission?

Well it seems that Official Russian outrage does not extend to the treatment of memorials at home.

Take the Russian monument commemorating the victims of the political oppression in the USSR located in Lubyanka Square in Moscow which is the location of the former KGB Headquarters. The memorial is also referred to as the Solovetsy Stone.

Memorial [Note: an NGO] had finally won permission to establish the monument it had first petitioned for in 1987: a large chunk of grey granite from the Solovetsky Islands in the White Sea, site of the first large-scale camps for political prisoners after the Bolshevik Revolution. The granite had been unloaded in the little park of spruces on one side of Dzerzhinsky Square, about equidistant from the statue of Iron Felix and the Lubyanka doors. The Politburo had approved the idea of a memorial to the "thousands" of victims of the repression "of the 1930's, 1940's and early 1950's." But the inscription on the granite, as thousands of people filed past and laid down their roses or carnations, quietly insisted on two facts: that the victims could not be counted in the thousands, and that the repression did not begin in the 1930's nor end in the 1950's. "To the Memory" the inscription read "of the millions of Victims of the Totalitarian Regime." - Dismantling Utopia by Scott Shane, Pages 143-144

Life expectancy in Russia is not as long as in western countries. That might help the Russian Government scrub away memories of abuse of Government power if nobody if left around to remind people of what living in Russia used to be like. This granite block seems to be the only sort of memorial in Moscow to the millions of victims of Soviet rule. Now, the Government is preparing to hide it away by putting it into storage.

Now, the authorities want to move the Stone, ostensibly to construct an underground power station for the metro. The Stone will be put in a place with restricted public access. Temporarily. Or so the authorities say. The very idea that the paranoid FSB would allow civilian underground construction so close to its headquarters already seems suspicious. And what is to keep this temporary construction project from becoming permanent, as so often happens in Russia? What if the authorities decide that they actually prefer the new inconvenient location of the Stone and don't return this eyesore and reminder of the excesses of the organs back to its rightful place in front of their headquarters? - (Read the story and Russian News of the controversy at Robert Amsterdam "Pardon Our Appearance: We're Building an Authoritarian State")

If the stone is taken away, it very well might be the last time it is ever seen, accidentally destroyed or lost while in storage. Now maybe if they actually get around to removing the statue, there will be a protest, but probably not to the extent as was seen in Estonia. First because many of the protesters in Estonia really just wanted to put down the Estonians and didn't actually care about the meaning of the statue itself, other than as a sign of Russia's once great power over others. And second, because they probably fear how Putin's Secret Police will respond against them.

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Denial of Service Attacks - Estonian Embassies Worldwide

Gee, this is pretty impressive. Go and try to find an Estonian Embassy website that is not under a denial of service attack.

Now the blame might be directed at Russian hackers, but I suspect that it is the Russian Government behind this. After all, there is nothing in it for hackers to waste resources to do this, unless someone is paying them to do it.

(Washington, DC)


(UN Consulate, NY)


(Canada)


(Germany)


(Denmark)


(Spain)


(Finland)


(France)


(Greece)


(Italy)


(Japan)


(Lithuania)


(Latvia)


(Poland)


(Russia)


(St. Petersburg)


(Sweden)


(Ukraine)


(UK)

And yes, there are no problems with my Internet service. (Posting this is proof of that.....)

Russian Actions against Estonia a Reminder that the Crimes of Communism Still Need to be Investigated

Russia is busy attacking tiny Estonia once again all because Estonia has removed a memorial erected in the middle of their Capital by the Soviets in celebration of their success in defeating the Nazis and in re-conquering Estonia.

This last week saw the Estonian Embassy in Moscow surrounded by a violent mob and all of a sudden both oil and coal shipments to the country have been halted, with the Russians giving lame excuses of scheduled maintenance and equipment shortages for the halt of shipments.

Now instead of backing down, Estonia has decided to fight back. The main act was to remove the occupation statue despite Russian threats not to do so. This resulted in an uproar in Russian youth (who know little about the criminal past of the Soviet Union) living both in Estonia and those who traveled from Russia. The press has been calling the protesters "ethnic Russians" inferring that the protesters/rioters are Estonian, but most are not.

The Russians claim that the statue was to memorize the fallen soldiers who fought to free Estonia from the Nazis. This of course neglects the Soviet Union's massive amount of assistance to Nazi Germany which allowed the Nazis to steamroll across half of Europe in the first place:

While Britain blockaded Germany at sea to prevent the import of war materials from overseas, all the supplies which the Reich needed for the war were sent directly from the Soviet Union by rail. Stalin promised that what the Soviets could not supply from her own resources, they would buy up on the world's markets and pass on to Germany. Three-eighths of the oil used by Germany in 1940 came from the Soviet Union including high-octane spirit for the Luftwaffe to fight the Battle of Britain. - Wikipedia

And

From the start of the war until Germany invaded the Soviet Union less than two years later, Stalin supplied Hitler with 1.5 million tons of oil, the same quantity of grain, and many thousands of tons of rubber, timber, phosphates (for making explosives), iron and many valuable metal ores, particularly chromium, manganese and platinum. At the time of the invasion, Germany was heavily in debt to the Soviet Union.

According to Mr. Rapoport , "one of Stalin's first gifts to the Nazis was to turn over some 600 German Communists, most of them Jews, to the Gestapo at Brest-Litovsk in German-occupied Poland.”. Soviets also offered support to Nazis in the official statements, Stalin himself emphasised that it was the Anglo-French alliance that had attacked Germany, not the other way round and Molotov affirmed that Germany had made peace efforts, which had been turned down by 'Anglo-French imperialists'. - Wikipedia

Now imagine how much shorter World War II could have been had the Soviet Union not supplied Nazi Germany as part of its attempt to grab half or Europe for itself.

(Germans and Soviets were not always enemies during WWII)

As part of Stalin's division of Europe with Hitler, it was the Soviets who invaded Estonia first:

Estonia was occupied by Soviet troops on October 18th 1939, as a consequence of the secret amendment to the August 1939 Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact between the Soviet Union and National Socialist Germany. The Red Army made its final occupation in June 1940. Estonia was formally annexed by the Soviet Union in August 1940 as the Estonian SSR. Many of the country's political and intellectual leaders were killed or deported to remote areas of the USSR by the Soviet authorities during 1940 to 1941. The repressions also included actions taken against thousands of ordinary people.

When the German Operation Barbarossa started against the Soviet Union, thousands of young Estonian men were forcibly drafted into the Red Army. Hundreds of political prisoners, whom the retreating Soviets had no time to move, were killed. The country was occupied by Germany from 1941 to 1944. Of the many Estonians who joined the German armed forces (including Waffen-SS), the majority did so only in 1944 when the threat of a new invasion of Estonia by Red Army had become imminent and it was clear that Germany would not win the war.

Soviet forces reconquered Estonia in the autumn of 1944 after fierce battles in the northeast of the country on the Narva river and on the Tannenberg Line (Sinimäed). In the face of the country being re-occupied by the Red Army, tens of thousands of people chose to either retreat together with the Germans or flee to Finland or Sweden.

In 1949, in response to slow progress in forming collective farms, as prescribed by the Soviet ideology, tens of thousands of people were forcibly deported in a few days either to labor camps or Siberia where half of them perished; the other half were not allowed to return until the early 1960s (several years after Stalin's death). - Wikipedia

One could say that the Nazis invaded Estonia to save it from the Russians. Even the Russian claims that they kicked the Germans out of Estonian appears to be a lie:

“The monument to the Soviet ‘liberation’ in September 1944 ... was one of the most hated monuments in Estonia until the Soviet occupation ended 50 years later,” wrote Laar, who was Estonia’s prime minister from 1992-1994 and 1999-2002. He is now leader of Estonia’s opposition center-right IRL union.

He said Estonian soldiers ejected Nazi German troops in 1944 and “restored their national government. The Red Army returned as the Nazis retreated and the flag which was ripped down from the tower of Toompea Castle was not the (Nazi) swastika, but the blue-black-white Estonian tricolor.”

Starting in the 1930s, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania were successively overwhelmed by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union. They regained their independence in the early 1990s and joined the European Union in 2004. - citizen.co.za

This gentleman is now calling for a commission to investigate exactly what happened while Eastern Europe was under Communist rule:

A former Estonian prime minister has suggested Russia and its Baltic neighbors jointly investigate their shared history since the 1930s to show how Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania were overwhelmed first by Nazi Germany, then the Soviet Union.

In an article published Friday in the Brussels-based European Voice weekly, Mart Laar said a panel of historians should lay to rest the controversy over the removal of a Soviet-era war memorial from downtown Tallinn.

Laar suggested the panel of historians be modeled after South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which led to pardons for those confessing to crimes committed during the country’s era of apartheid. - citizen.co.za

Now this incident has reminded Poland that they too have Soviet Statues that they don't want:

The Ministry of Culture and National Heritage of Poland is developing a program that will allow local authorities destroy or relocate monuments erected in the Socialist era. Polish Minister of Culture Kazimierz Ujazdowski stated that “symbols of the communist dictatorship will disappear from the cities and streets of Poland as alien to Polish culture.” - Kommersant

As I wrote before in "Europe's Lingering Scar of Communism" until the crimes of communism are investigated, we will not be able to properly document the criminal actions of the Soviet Union. As long as this is not done, the problem with Russia and young Russians is only going to grow, especially since it is the parents and grand parents telling the younger generation how 'great' things were under the Soviet Union compared to how much they suck now.

I have no doubt that life for Russians in Estonia was better for them during Soviet times, but that was at the expense of the Estonians who were forced to accept the Russian migrants and their taking control of most whatever they wanted. This combined with Russian propaganda denying that they ever occupied Estonia is sure to increase the instability in the Baltic States for years to come if not addressed:

Estonia was occupied by the Nazis in World War II and then ruled by Moscow for five decades.

Russia denies the Soviet years amounted to an "occupation" of Estonia. - BBC

Last year the Council of Europe voted against investigating the crimes of Communism, mainly thanks to the Socialist members of the Council who are not interested in seeing Soviet Crimes linked to Socialist movements in the rest of Europe. Perhaps another organization should be created to do the investigation before the witnesses all die of old age. The crimes also need to be properly documented and the Russian population properly educated on the criminal history of their country as part of the process of ensuring that Communism is never glorified again. Just as Nazism has been properly convicted and sentenced so should communism, if for no other reason than to not saddle Russia's youth with the crimes of two generations past.

Despite the backlash Estonia has received from Russia for merely moving a Soviet statue, Poland will most likely pass a law permitting the destruction of Soviet monuments. This understandably has the Russians truly pissed off and sputtering all sorts of lies to turn the victims into the criminals.

If the draft laws are passed, local authorities will have the right to scrap or transfer monuments to Soviet soldiers and memorials related with the liberation of Poland from Nazis. This law is called an act of “decommunisation”, and ideologues of Law and Justice increasingly often call Poland’s liberation by the Soviet Army is 1944-1945 a “new occupation”.

If the two laws are adopted, streets and squares of Polish cities named after the Soviet military or Polish statesmen and party figures of the Socialist period can be renamed. A list of such streets has been already prepared in the Institute of National Memory and circulated to local authorities.

Also known are monuments slated for scrapping. These are a monument to the Soviet-Polish combat brotherhood in Warsaw, a monument to fallen heroes in the town of Szamotuly, two monuments to Soviet soldiers in Dombrow-Gurnice. In Katowice, a monument to the Red Army soldier is to be replaced by a statue of the late US president Ronald Reagan. War memorials in Krakow, Rzeszow and other cities are also in jeopardy. - ITAR TASS (Russia, which explains the pro-Soviet slant)

One thing in Poland's favor is that they do not have to deal with Ethnic Russians as there are not many at all, if any, remaining there. Russia will have to resort to retaliating from abroad. Poland, of course, was the country that the Soviets and Germans split between themselves. So the Russian claim that the Soviets liberated Poland from the Nazis is insulting.

I have been told that the Russians are constantly knocking down their own monuments with no regard to anything than the thinking of the moment. They sure did not waste any time getting rid of their Lenin and Stalin statues. They even went and un-named Leningrad and Stalingrad (which was renamed well before the Soviet Union fell apart). So as far as I can tell, Estonia acted in a much more honorable fashion than Russia does in its own country.

Even if the Estonian Statue and Polish actions were not in the news to remind the world of the criminal activity of the Soviet Union, another statue would have done so. This is the Memorial to the victims of Communism which will be dedicated in Washington, DC on June12th.

(Proposed Memorial to the Victims of Communism, Washington, DC)

Russia should wake up and be honest with its people and the world about the crimes of the Soviet Union. Otherwise Russia will be just as guilty as the communist state that it replaced. Unfortunately, their recent actions don't indicate any willingness to come clean.

More on Estonia's WWII story by CDR Salamander.

Itching for Eestimaa has a great explanation of "why exactly the Estonian state was not content to allow a memorial to the army that supported these actions in Estonia stand beside its national library and the church where it buries its leaders."

Stockholm Slender at Botanist on Alp explains what would have happened if the Soviets managed to occupy Finland as they did Estonia, noting that it was the Red Army that brutally raped Estonia. It is amazing that the Estonian State survived at all.

The Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation
Soviet-German cooperation - Wikipedia
Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact - Wikipedia

Remembering the Soviet Union v.1

Europe's Lingering Scar of Communism

Lets start with this quote:

In an extraordinary joint statement, more than 200 Socialist members of the European Parliament hailed the American election results (2006 Congressional Elections) as "the beginning of the end of a six-year nightmare for the world." - Breitbart

Fine. In their eyes, America under the Bush Administration is no utopia. But lets be serious, under what definition are they calling it a global nightmare? How does it compare to World War I? World War II? and the decades-long nightmare of the former Soviet Union? Or was life in the USSR some sort of intellectual 'enlightenment'? What about the horror of what is going on in Zimbabwe, in which the US is in no way responsible? What about the genocide going on in Sudan in which the US is in no way responsible? (The US is one of the only countries to actually declare the Darfur killing as Genocide.) Then we have the perennial disaster areas of Cuba and North Korea. None of these global crisis's come up on the Socialist radar scope. Only that the US is not willing to rollover and comply with their agenda.

The only problem with dismissing this type of comment outright is the mere fact of how powerful Socialism and Socialists are in Europe.

With 200 members the PES's "Socialist Group" is the second largest group in the European Parliament. - Wikipedia

This is one reason why the US traditionally has had problems with the Governments of Europe. It has little to do with Bush's actions in attacking Iraq. They hated him well before September 11 and had no intention of working with his administration. After all, the Socialist plan has problems if other plans do well, especially if the US economy does well.

It is also the reason why a recent resolution to set up "committees of 'independent experts' in Europe to investigate the crimes of Communism" was rejected:

more than half the assembly's members did not turn up at all. (A two-third's majority was required to pass) - Spectrezine

This was despite an investigation by the Council of Europe on the "Need for international condemnation of crimes of Communism.":

The need for international condemnation of crimes of communism is very important, not only to condemn crimes in the past, but also utterly important to continuously condemn the ongoing crimes in the communist countries, still at large.

So far, neither the Council of Europe nor any other international intergovernmental organization has undertaken the task of general evaluation of communist rules, serious discussion on the crimes committed in their name, and their public condemnation.

Indeed, however difficult it is to understand, there has been no serious, in-depth debate on the ideology which was, and is, at the root of widespread terror, massive human rights violations, death of many millions of individuals, and the plight of whole nations. Whereas another totalitarian regime of the XXth century, namely Nazism, has been investigated, internationally condemned and the perpetrators have been brought to trial, similar crimes committed in the name of communism have neither been investigated nor received any international condemnation.

The absence of international condemnation may be partly explained by the existence of countries whose rule is still based on communist ideology. The wish to maintain good relations with some of them may prevent certain politicians from dealing with this difficult subject.

Furthermore, many politicians still active today have supported, in one way or another, former communist regimes. For obvious reasons they would prefer not to deal with the question of responsibility. In many European countries there are communist parties which have not formally condemned the crimes of communism. Last but not least, different elements of communist ideology such as equality or social justice still seduce many politicians.

However, I am of the opinion, that there is an urgent need for public debate on the crimes of communism and their condemnation at international level. It should be done without any further delay for several reasons:

Firstly, for the sake of general perception, it should be clear that all crimes, including those committed in the name of ideology, praising the most respectable ideals like equality and justice, are condemned, and there is no exception to this principle. This is particularly important for young generations who have no personal experience of communist rule. The clear position of the international community on the past may be a reference for their future actions.

Secondly, as long as victims of communist regimes or their families are still alive, it is not too late to give them moral restitution for their suffering.

Last but not least, the communist regimes are still active in some countries of the world, and the crimes committed in the name of communist ideology continue to take place. - Goran Lindblad, Swedish Parliament

Go read the whole thing.

Since the Russians are members of the Council of Europe, they participated in the discussion. Of course they argued against any attempt to investigate the Soviet Union:

Konstantin Kosachev, chairman of the State Duma's international affairs committee and head of Russia's delegation to PACE, led the fight against the report. Kosachev claimed that not all communist regimes were criminal or violent, though he did not clarify how he categorized the Soviet Union in that regard. "Not everything that's red is blood, some of it may be tomato juice, Mr. Lindblad" -- he lashed out at the rapporteur during the official debate (Interfax, January 25). Moreover, Kosachev charged that the report seeks to assign to the USSR a share of the responsibility for the Second World War and the division of Europe. Finally, he contended that Communist ideology could not be grouped together with Nazi ideology under the category of "totalitarian." Implicitly excusing the former, Kosachev insisted that the report must not place those two ideologies on the same footing. - Eurasia Daily

Now imagine if the vote concerned the US. Do you think that half of them would not show up. Take the following comments from Greek Council of Europe member Mikis Theodorakis:

In Greece public outcry against the resolution has been overwhelming, spanning the entire political spectrum from right to left. Internationally renowned composer Mikis Theodorakis said the Council of Europe has decided to “distort” history “by equating the victims with the villains. The criminals with the heroes. The conquerors with the liberators and the Nazis with the communists.”

The resolution opens the way for “the ghosts of Hitler and Himmler,” who “began their career by outlawing the Communist Parties and by locking up the Communists in death camps,” Theodorakis said.

Meanwhile the council has been silent on U.S. aggression, torture and other human rights violations, he noted. “I have but one word to address to those ‘gentlemen’: Shame!” - People's Weekly World

Yes, shame indeed! Talk about having no shame. 'Distort' history my ass.

Now the quote above from Russian Konstantin Kosachev does expose one of Moscow's fears in all of this. Being blamed for World War II and being put on the same level as Nazi Germany. More on that below.

So why the lack of enthusiasm to properly record the crimes of the Soviet Union and Communism in Europe? First, when you compare the two ideologies of Communism and Socialism, you will see that they are very much similar, and for good reason:

Communism is an ideology that seeks to establish a classless, stateless social organization, based upon common ownership of the means of production. It can be classified as a branch of the broader socialist movement - Wikipedia - Communism

The main difference in the two ideologies is to the level that one should go in order to attain the goals. So if you attack the ideals of one, then you are in fact attacking the ideals of the other. And if there is a serious investigation of the crimes of the Soviet Union, a number of current members of Socialist parties may be implicated in those crimes as well as some of the Communist and Socialist parties currently active in European Politics.

Now the Socialists are quick to distinguish themselves from Communists, but the two ideologies are closely related. In fact some Socialist political groups in Europe are the offspring of former Communist groups. Take Finland's Left Alliance (Vasemmistoliitto):

The party was founded as a result of a merger between the Finnish People's Democratic League (SKDL), the Finnish Women's Democratic League (SNDL), and the Communist Party of Finland (SKP). The founding meeting was held in April 1990 in Helsinki, following the publishing of the April Declaration, which emphasised the need for a party that would promote the ideals of the French Revolution - liberty, equality, and fraternity - in addition to peace and environmental values.

The party's short history has been characterised by internal disputes and bickering, as it was formed by people with very different views on society. There have been several large-scale defections from the Left Alliance to the Social Democratic Party and the newly formed Communist Party of Finland (Unity). In 2005, the party's former secretary and SAK's assistant head Matti Viialainen formed a society to promote a merger between the two largest Finnish left-wing political parties, the Left Alliance and the Social Democrats. This caused an outrage within the Left Alliance, and Viialainen was condemned of wanting to break up the party. - Wikipedia

Their actions as listed above certainly blurs the distinctions between Communism, Socialism and even the liberals.

While living in Finland I was warned a couple of times to be careful what I say when criticizing the Soviet Union as "Many people here supported the Soviet Union" and that I might hurt some feelings if I was too critical. It is even more amusing when these very same people who warn me about criticizing a confirmed failed ideology are so quick to criticize the US and President Bush, about anything.

This is an important issue because it appears that Socialists and ex-Communists are busy trying to erase the past, rewrite history, and even glorify Communism. Take the following:

Tampere city council to name park after communist Finnish civil war leader - 7.12.2004 at 16:03

The Tampere city council on Tuesday decided to name a park after Hugo Salmela, the Red Guard officer who led the defence of the communist stronghold in the 1918 civil war.

The initiative came from councillor Taavi Lintunen, a communist.

Hugo Salmela, an actor by trade, was in charge of the Red Guards as the government troops, led by then General C G E Mannerheim, approached the industrial city, built on a narrow isthmus between two lakes.

Mr Salmela was an anomaly among Red Guard commanders as he proved his military prowess in the battle. He died in an explosion before the city was sacked by Gen Mannerheim.

The city commission tasked with place names felt that the city should commemorate the Red leader in the name of equality [You have to be f.ing kidding me.] as the board in the summer decided to name another park in memory of Marshal Mannerheim.

Despite - or because of - the fact that Tampere was the key battleground of the civil war, the city does not want to cast its mind back to those events 86 years ago.

The sacking of Tampere destroyed the city and Gen Mannerheim's troops exacted terrible retribution, including executing thousands of prisoners.

Somewhat controversially, the city fathers in 1956 vehemently rejected the idea of erecting a statue of a White Guards general in the centre of Tampere. Marshal Mannerheim's statue to this day stands in the middle of a forest.

The wounds of the war are slow to heal in the city. Before Independence Day - 6 December - the statue was once again smeared with red paint and the word 'lahtari', butcher, painted on it. /STT/ - Virtual Finland 2004

Go here to see a picture of the Mannerheim Statue in the Forest. For those who are not familiar with Mannerheim, not only was he a Finnish General, he also served as President of Finland at the end of WWII. So just where does he rank in terms of 'Greatness':

Mannerheim was deservedly voted as the greatest Finn ever, thanks to saving 5 million people from communism - twice. That kind of achievement is hard to beat. - Purpose and Scope

The first time he saved Finland from Communism was during the Finnish Civil War that happened when the country declared independence from Russia. You can see why he might not be a hero to the Communists. While his statue is desecrated with being called a butcher, no such accusations were ever made by the Finnish Government against their former neighbor.

That story is nothing. Would you believe that Russia is even denying that they occupied Estonia, and I would think that they probably would deny that they occupied any nation at the end of World War II:

Estonia was occupied by the Nazis in World War II and then ruled by Moscow for five decades.

Russia denies the Soviet years amounted to an "occupation" of Estonia. - BBC

No, of course not. You see, the Soviets 'liberated' Estonia, the other Baltic States, Poland and the rest of Eastern Europe from the Nazis. OK, I will give them that. Unfortunately, they then forgot to leave, in essence, replacing the Nazis. This current disagreement between Estonia and Russia stems from Estonia's plans to both ban Communist symbols as well as remove a Soviet-era memorial.

Moscow described plans in Estonia to criminalize Soviet symbols like the hammer and sickle - effectively equating them with the Nazi swastika - as "blasphemous".

The president of Estonia has signed into law a bill allowing the removal of a controversial Soviet war memorial from the centre of the capital Tallinn.

The bronze statue of a Soviet soldier, erected in 1947, is regarded by many as a symbol of Soviet occupation. However, the large ethnic-Russian population in Estonia see it as a symbol of liberation from the Nazis.

The decision has angered Russia too. The Russian parliament is expected to adopt a statement denouncing the law. The soldier has become a symbol of the divisions in Estonian society, says the BBC's Baltic correspondent Laura Sheeter.

The Soviet Union annexed Estonia at the end of World War II, and it remained a Soviet republic until the collapse of the USSR nearly 50 years later.

'Lack of respect'

After clashes at the monument between Estonian nationalists and ethnic Russian activists last year, the government decided that it should be taken down, and moved to a less controversial location. [How about moving it to Moscow? ed.] To that end they proposed two bills - one which allows them to move monuments which glorify any occupying power, and the other, which was passed on Wednesday - which allows for the exhumation and reburial of soldiers' remains. It is thought that several soldiers are buried underneath the monument, and the government argues that it is impossible for their graves to receive the proper respect, when protesters gather and fight at the site. - pro2

The story fails to point out that the Large ethnic Russian population in Estonia was not 'liberated' from the Nazis. They were implanted by the Soviets after the war to ensure that Estonia would not revolt from Soviet rule. (While deporting, the locals, or worse.)

(The Soviets left behind when the Soviet Union fell apart were not kicked out of the Baltics and Estonia when they became independent again. They were given an opportunity to join their new home country. Many have so far declined to take the steps to do so. Then again, they have also not bothered to move back to mother Russia. At least they are not that stupid....)

Thankfully, the Baltic states are ignoring the critics, starting with Russia, and slowly trying to undue the damage done by both Nazi and Soviet occupation. There are even calls that Russia compensate the countries that they forcibly occupied at the end of World War II:

Vytautas Landsbergis is one of the most active politicians, who urge Russia to compensate Lithuania and other post-Soviet republics for damage done to them during their occupations. - Wikipedia, Vytautas Landsbergis

Unfortunately, in addition to Socialists, there is no shortage of active Communists in Europe to this day:

In January 2005, Professor Landsbergis, backed by another Member of the European Parliament from Hungary, urged a ban on the Soviet and Nazi symbols. He also sent a letter to Mr. Franco Frattini, the European Commissioner of Justice and Internal Affairs, where he suggested that in case the EU decides to ban Nazi symbols, Communist symbols should be banned too. The Commissioner became interested in this proposal and said: "I am ready to join this discussion. The Communist dictatorships no less than the Nazi ones are responsible for the deaths of tens of millions of people". A bit later, however, the Commissioner under pressure from Italian communists backed off his initial statement.

Professor Landsbergis' proposal caused quite a stir in Italy where Italian leftists, in the beginning of February 2005, strongly protested against such a move. The reformed Communist Party and Italian Communists were outraged at Landsbergis' proposal. The Professor's proposal became the center of the Italian media's attention. One of the most influential Italian dailies, La Repubblica, even published an interview with Professor Vytautas Landsbergis outlining his proposal. It was the first time when the daily allocated a full page for a politician from Lithuania.

Nevertheless, Landsbergis' proposal found few supporters among Italian politicians. However one who did, Alessandra Mussolini, a grand-daughter of former Italian fascist dictator Benito Mussolini commented: "To implement the proposal of the Members of the European Parliament regarding Communist symbols is our moral duty".

The proposal of Professor Landsbergis did not go by without a response from the Russian Parliament as well. The First Vicespeaker of the Russian State Duma called Professor's proposal "abnormal". Another Russian MP, a communist, commented by saying that "somebody in Europe became insolent and forgot who saved them from the fascists".

However, the debate came to an end when, in the beginning of February 2005, the European Commission rejected calls for a proposed Europe-wide ban on Nazi symbols to be extended to cover Communist Party symbols as well. EU Justice Commissioner Franco Frattini said it would not be appropriate to include the red star and the hammer and sickle in a draft EU law on racism.

Finally, at the end of February 2005, the European Union dropped proposals to ban Nazi symbols across its 25 member states. Luxembourg withdrew the plan when it became clear that members could not reach a consensus on which symbols to ban. There were also concerns that the proposed ban was a threat to freedom of expression. - Wikipedia

Since when has the hammer and sickle become a symbol of Communism? It was the symbol of the Soviet Union. Notice the outrage that the Soviet Union might be compared to Nazi Germany. This seems to be the biggest 'outrage' that Communists have about criticism of the Soviet Union. Forget the gulags, the forced relocations, the artificial food shortages, etc. How dare you compare the Soviet Union to Nazi Germany. After all, it was the Army of the Soviet Union that liberated Europe. Just look at the reactions of some European MPs:

The Belgian Communist party, the PCB, called the motion "a violent attack on history, present and future of communism". The Greek KKE called it "a declaration of war and persecution against all communist parties", and Germany's PDS said it was "neo McCarthyism".

Mikis Theodorakis, the Greek composer, said: "In the name of our dead comrades, of those who passed through the hands of the Gestapo and the death camps ... shame on those who want to turn victims into executioners, heroes into criminals and communists into Nazis."

French communists said the motion "banalises the Holocaust" and "ignores the communist role in fighting fascism".

André Guerin, a Lyon MP, told Le Figaro that the council's idea was to "definitively bury the values of communism" and "make believe they are outmoded and that the only alternative is capitalism". - Guardian

Well, that of course forgets these inconvenient facts:

Stalin's Intervention to ensure Hitler's Election in Germany:

During the critical 1932 German elections, he forbid the German Communists from collaborating with the Social Democrats. These parties together gained more votes than Hitler and could have prevented him from becoming Chancellor. - Wikipedia

Alliance with Hitler / Nazi Germany

The Soviet Union had Hitler's back at the start of World War II by agreeing to split Europe amongst themselves drawing a line right through Poland. (Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact)

It is common knowledge that Nazi Germany attacked Poland (on 1 September 1939) but not so common knowledge that the Soviet Union attacked Poland from the East. (On 17 September 1939)

Support of Nazi Germany

From the signing of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact in August, 1939 through almost the end of the first half of 1941, Stalin and the USSR fed and equipped Hitler and Germany as Germany invaded Western Europe and then attacked Great Britain by air. - Wikipedia

Partially Responsible for World War II

According to the Historian Richard Pipes, the Communist states share some responsibility for World War II. Both Hitler and Mussolini used the Soviet Union as a model for their own totalitarian states and Hitler privately expressed that Stalin was a "genius". In turn, Stalin expressed desire for another great war that would leave his enemies weakened and allow Soviet expansion. He allowed the testing and production of German weapons that were forbidden by the Versailles Treaty to occur on Soviet territory. - Wikipedia

Surely the Communists of today have simple explanations for all this. However, until Europe decides to face up to examining the crimes of the Soviet Union, we will not hear them. Unfortunately, nor will we be able to properly document the crimes that were committed.

In response to the quote by the Socialists at the top of this post, I leave you with this from the website of the yet unveiled Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation:

A Moral Blind Spot - It is a great moral failing for a free society to misunderstand the extent of Communism's atrocities. While the horrors of Nazism are well known, who knows that the Soviet Union murdered 20 million people? Who knows that China's dictators have slaughtered an estimated 60 million? Who knows that the Communist holocaust has exacted a death toll surpassing that of all of the wars of the 20th century combined?

Just as we must grasp Communism's brutality, we must understand the true cause of this era's most significant event: the fall of the Soviet Union. As Vaclav Havel said, "The fall of the Communist empire is an event on the same scale of historical importance as the fall of the Roman Empire." The West's triumph over the "evil empire" was no accident of history. It was the result of a calculated strategy by a grand alliance of political, military, religious, business and labor leaders. These leaders deserve credit for the victory over Communism many thought impossible. - VCMF

How sad to know that a Soviet Citizen during WWII was more likely to be killed by his own Government than the Nazis. That's how bad the Soviet Union was.

(Proposed Memorial to the Victims of Communism, Washington, DC)

The Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation
Council of Europe Resolution 1481 - Wikipedia
Homepage - Socialist Group in the European Parliment
Russia and Estonia in Soviet spat - BBC
Estonia to remove Soviet memorial - BBC
Carnival of German-American Relations - Atlantic Review

Finnish Triple-Murderer Escapes from an 'Open Institution'

What exactly is an Open Institution?

Inmates participating in work or other activities and who are considered to suit in freer circumstances and are not likely to leave the institution without permission, are placed in open institutions. In open institutions inmates always use their own clothes. All open institutions are intoxicant-free institutions, in which an inmate is required to controlled commitment not to use intoxicants. - Finnish Prison Service

Here is a photo of facility that the triple murderer escaped from:

("The Hamina Work Colony is a minimum security penal facility". HS Photo)

As you can see, this 'prison' is dependant on the prisoners not walking away. This is why, as it says above, they only put low-risk inmates in there. Here is where is gets tricky as the Finns, with their European-style 'forgive the criminal' mentality decided that a triple murderer with a life sentence was a low-risk criminal.

Convicted triple murderer Juha Valjakkala, who currently goes under the name Nikita Joakim Fouganthine, escaped from the Hamina Work Colony run by the Finnish Prison Service in the south coast city of Hamina on Monday night.

Valjakkala was last seen at the minimum security penal facility at roll call Monday evening at about 10:00 PM. His absence was noticed at eight in the morning, on Tuesday, which means that the escapee could have a head start of up to ten hours. - HS

Now if it makes you feel any better, according to their rules, he did not exactly escape. He just left without permission:

Leaving an open institution is not considered as an escape. If a prisoner has left the institution without permission, he can be ordered as a disciplinary punishment a loss of served time at most 20 days. In 2005 18 (27 in 2004) prisoners left an open institution without permission. - Prison Service

He must have had a good reason to leave, because being in prison in Finland is almost like not being in prison at all.

You get the have private visits with the wife:

Prisoners have the right to receive visitors at certain times reserved for visits during weekends and for a special reason at other times as well. In prisons there are family meeting rooms were close family members may meet in home-like circumstances for a few hours without supervision. - PS

Your even allowed to go on vacation from prison:

A prisoner may be granted a permission of leave after he/she has served a half of the sentence or if there is an especially important reason. The permission is granted if it is likely that the prisoner complies with the permission conditions. To a prisoner guilty of aggravated drug or violent offence or a prisoner who has earlier violated the permission conditions grossly can permission of leave be granted only if the complying with of the conditions is considered almost certain. - PS

And the Government pays for it:

Travel costs on the permission of leave are paid from state funds if the permission has been granted due to a close relative’s serious illness. Also the travels during the first leave and always when it is 6 months since the last return are paid by the state. Then the cheapest way of travel must be used. A prisoner may not leave the Nordic countries. - PS

Did you catch that last part? You can even leave the country. I would think that these events would be family related. I can't see even the Finns letting prisoners out to that they can go to a rock concert or something. So if it is a family event, why not require the family to pay for their loved one to show up.

So, lets back back to this wandering ex-triple murderer. Here is a summary of his Wikipedia page:

Juha Veikko Valjakkala (born June 13, 1965) became a part of Finnish and Swedish crime history in 1988 when he was convicted of the murder of a family of three at a cemetery in the northern Swedish community of Åmsele.

The series of events that led to the murders began when the 22-year-old Valjakkala was released from a prison in Turku on May 1, 1988, after which he started wandering through Sweden and Finland with his 21-year-old girlfriend Marita Routalammi.

On July 3 they arrived in Åmsele. After nightfall Valjakkala stole a bicycle. He was pursued by Sten Nilsson and his 15-year-old son Fredrik. The chase ended at a cemetery where Sten and Fredrik Nilsson were both shot by Valjakkala with a shotgun. Later Sten's wife and Fredrik's mother, Ewa Nilsson, went looking for the two and was stabbed to death by Valjakkala outside the cemetery. Valjakkala and Routalammi were caught in Odense, Denmark just over a week later.

Valjakkala was given a life sentence on three counts of murder, while Routalammi got off with two years for complicity in assault and battery. Routalammi was released after serving half of her time, and Valjakkala was transferred to Finland to serve out the rest of his sentence.

In April 1994 Valjakkala fled the Riihimäki prison where he was being held. He took a teacher as a hostage, but he was apprehended nearby and the hostage escaped the situation unscathed. He has also tried to escape once in 1991. - Wiki

He also attempted to escape from a prison (with fences) in 2004. That totals three attempted escapes prior to this escape. That does not include his arrest in 2002, in Sweden, where he went while on furlough/vacation from prison. He went and failed to return. So lets call it four attempted escapes.

If he is caught, his punishment would only be an additional 20 days which means nothing since he is serving a life sentence. for those familiar, a life sentence in Finland is about 12 years. He has already served 18 years and was waiting for a Presidential pardon. It might be that he got tired waiting.

I am taking a beating for my harsh stance on punishment of crime at this site here that is discussing this escape. It keeps getting brought up that it is the US's harsh punishment of criminals that is the cause of the America's high crime rate, compared to Finland and Europe's in general. I call BS on that and here is a little to back that up:

SUPERIOR POLICING does little good without a commitment from the justice system to keep violent thugs off the streets. The United States has the longest prison sentences in the Western world. According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics and its counterparts in other countries, a convicted armed robber can expect to serve about four and a half years behind bars in the United States, a little over two years in Great Britain, a bit less in Germany, and less than 18 months in France. The United States imprisons nearly 700 out of 100,000 citizens as compared to about 125 in the U.K. and Canada, 100 in Germany, and about 60 in most of Scandinavia. Some of these countries may actually have fewer thugs than the United States, but those left unpunished do enormous damage.

While building and staffing prisons costs a great deal, letting criminals roam free costs even more. One violent criminal can do over a million dollars worth of damage in the space of a year. A single armed robbery costs society more than $50,000, and a hardened thug can commit a hundred such crimes in a year. The European elite still seems to regard Americans' desire to lock up violent criminals as an index of barbarism and America as a nation gripped by violence and infatuated with rough, frontier justice. With violence and theft exploding all over the developed world, however, one has to ask which type of society is barbaric--one that punishes criminals, or one that lets them prey on law-abiding citizens?

Not surprisingly, overwhelming evidence demonstrates that keeping criminals locked up reduces crime. British academic Donald E. Lewis's comprehensive 1986 examination of studies on the correlation between sentence length and crime rates (published in the British Journal of Criminology) concludes that doubling the length of the sentence for a crime will cut the likelihood that criminals will commit that crime by a little less than 50 percent. In a comprehensive comparison of crime rates in the United States and Great Britain, a Bureau of Justice Statistics researcher and the head of Cambridge University's Criminology Institute hit on the key fact: Crime rates fell in the United States as punishment increased and rose in Britain as punishment decreased. As James Q. Wilson has observed, "coincident with rising prison population there began in 1979-80 a steep reduction in the crime rate as reported by the victimization surveys." - Weekly Standard

OK, the study mentioned is a bit old, so here is a comparison of the percent change in crime between 1997 and 2001. (Appears to be the most recent study, released in 2003.)

Homicide:
- Finland +12%
- US -12%

Violent Crime:
- Finland +7%
- US -12%

Robbery:
- Finland +7%
- US -15%

Domestic Burglary:
- Finland -24%
- US -14%

Car Theft:
- Finland +3%
- US -9%

Drug Trafficking:
- Finland +79%
- US 0

While the US has a higher absolute crime rate, the trend for the US is a decline in crime. That can't be said for Finland.

Take this from the 'murder' entry in Wikipedia:

Finland is the most violent nation in Western Europe according to several recent studies. The most likely way to get "manslaughtered" in Finland is to get stabbed or severely beaten by an intoxicated male person. Also, guns such as rifles and shotguns have traditionally been more usual in Finland than in most of Europe due to the popularity of hunting. There are over a million registered guns and firearms in private ownership in Finland while the country's entire population is only a little over five million. - Wiki

So Finland shouldn't brag about their low crime rate, unless they are bragging to Americans. Keep in mind that being drunk is an acceptable excuse in Finland as to why a person is not guilty of murder.

Finland is not the only country with this problem. I have a good friend from Estonia. She had mentioned that Estonians go to Sweden to commit crimes because even if they get caught, Swedish jails are not that bad.

What is the right way to treat a triple-murderer like Juha Valjakkala? I would think that this would be a person worthy of the death penalty. The Finns think otherwise. And that is why he is now out loose wandering the Finnish, or even perhaps the Swedish countryside.

You can bet that Juha has no problems with the Finnish system. Neither do two other Finns who have committed murder in the US and then fled to Finland, to avoid the death penalty.

Finnish triple murderer escapes from minimum security prison - Helsingin Sanomat
Crime Without Punishment - Weekly Standard
International comparisons of criminal justice statistics 2001 - PDF
Finnish Murderers - Wiki


Update: 1 December 2006

Finnish police have recaptured escaped* triple murderer Juha Valjakkala.

Police arrested escaped triple murderer Juha Valjakkala at his private home in the Maunula district of Helsinki at 7:30 Thursday evening. Valjakkala, who had escaped from the Hamina Work Colony run by the Finnish Prison Service in the south coast city of Hamina on Monday night, did not put up any resistance when he was arrested. - Helsingin Sanomat

Great they have caught him, but this follow-up story makes this whole case even stranger. For starters, what is a person who has been in jail for the last 18 years, serving a life sentence, doing with an apartment? How is he paying the bills for the apartment? Is the Government paying the bills? Why didn't he have the place rented out? Are there some protections in place because it would be unfair if he lost his home while in prison?

Just how did he get to Helsinki? Why he stole a car of course:

Jalonen thinks that it is likely that Valjakkala drove to Helsinki in a car that was stolen from Hamina at about the time that he fled the city. The car was found in Maunula the following day. However, Jalonen emphasised that the investigation is not yet complete. - Helsingin Sanomat

Good thing the car owner did not confront him. After all, this guy killed three people over a bicycle. A bicycle. Is he in jail for theft of a bicycle? No, for murder. That was how far this guy was willing to go as a criminal. Killing for no real reason. It's not like he was robbing a bank or other hi-stakes crime.

Minister of Justice Leena Luhtanen (SDP) said on Thursday that transferring Juha Valjakkala from an ordinary prison to a more open labour colony was a mistake.

Speaking in Parliament during Question Time, Luhtanen noted that the decision was made by the Criminal Sanctions Agency, and that the Ministry of Justice had no knowledge of the matter.

MP Petri Salo (Nat. Coalition Party) asked how it was possible that a triple murderer with a record of four escapes could be moved to a labour colony where supervision of inmates is more difficult, and escape is easier. - Helsingin Sanomat

Too bad there will not be a serious questioning of this case. He will be put into a real prison for a while, but not for very long. After all, he was recommended to be pardoned and released. (Keep in mind that according to the law, he did not escape despite the title of the article.)

Inspector Jukka Siltaloppi of the Criminal Sanctions Agency says that Valjakkala will be placed immediately in a closed prison.

Siltaloppi believes that Valjakkala will not have any hope of getting a furlough or being transferred to a minimum security prison for at least six months to a year.

He also faces disciplinary action, which could vary from a warning to solitary confinement. - Helsingin Sanomat

Wow. No vacations for at least six months and it will be at least a half year before he can escape again from the Hamina facility. The police also managed to interrupt a meeting he was having with a woman:

In addition to Valjakkala there was a woman about 40 years old in the apartment. The National Bureau of Investigation is looking into her possible involvement in the events, but police say that she is being treated as an outsider.

"She has certainly had some kind of relationship with Valjakkala, but we have not yet investigated the matter", said Police Inspector Kari Jalonen. - Helsingin Sanomat

Treated as an outsider? What the hell is that. She was found in the apartment with the most-wanted man in Finland. She was either a hostage or she was an accomplice. Looking at this Finnish article here where they interview the woman, it seems she was more of a girlfriend although she claims in the article that there is no love there, even though she met him in prison and continued to write and that the apartment was hers and that he just took his vacations there. Yeah right. (Feel free to add a better translation in the comments if I misunderstood.) Anyway, they did not take her in for questioning, which is how the news reporter got her hands on her.

Clearly, this is not the end of the story. He is not dead yet.

The Finns are lucky that their murder rate is low. I can't see how they could manage with too many more murderers to deal with. They won't have to deal with this one for much longer as he is overdue for release. Yes, I know that he is in for life, but in Finnish terms that's about 12 years. As it stands now, he has been in prison longer than anyone else in Finland.

Update: 2 December 2006

Juha Valjakkala tried to hang himself in prison. Unfortunately, he did not succeed so they will still have to deal with him once he gets out of prison. Interesting in that he proved so efficient in being able to kill others yet failed when attempting to kill himself. Maybe he is no longer a danger to society.

Kolmoismurhaaja Juha Valjakkala yritti perjantaina itsemurhaa. Ilta-Sanomien mukaan Valjakkala yritti hirttäytyä vankisellissään Helsingin vankilassa eli Sörkässä. - Helsingin Sanomat

Surely this story is nowhere finished.

Update: 4 December

Here is the summary of the hanging attempt in English:

Juha Valjakkala, who was sentenced to life imprisonment for killing three members of the same family in northern Sweden in 1988, tried to hang himself after being re-arrested on Thursday. Valjakkala escaped from a low security prison at Hamina in Finland on Monday but was seized three days later at an apartment in Helsinki.

Now he is being detained under police guard in a psychiatric ward in the Finnish capital, according to Aftonbladet and the Finnish paper Ilta Sanomat. Two hours after Valjakkala was arrested on Thursday he was found in his cell "in a bad condition". He was taken to the emergency ward of Helsinki's Maria hospital.However, his injuries were not judged to be serious and Valjakkala was taken to a secure psychiatric ward. - The Local, Sweden

How is it possible that he could have managed to try and kill himself within two hours of being recaptured? Wasn't he interrogated? How often do guards go around checking inmates? Are Finnish criminals that different that they can be relied upon to behave on their own?

There are some other things that bother me. How is it that he was permitted to change his name? Really. Just think about that. In a country of about 5 million people, they kind of know who their infamous criminals are (I am told) so it is completely idiotic to permit an infamous criminal to change his name and give him a new identity. Poor him if he is stuck with a name that everyone recognizes, for the wrong reasons.

Also, when are European countries going to stop transferring prisoners back to their home country to serve their sentences? I can understand that it makes it easier for the relative to visit prisoners, but shouldn't the prisoners take that into consideration prior to doing the crime? At least in the case of murder, I would think that the country where the crime took place might have more of an interest in ensuring that the prisoner is kept locked up. If they are willing to commit crimes in other countries they should be ready to face justice on those other countries, including the death penalty, like in the US.

*"Leaving an open institution is not considered as an escape." Finnish Prison Service

Police catch escaped triple murderer Juha Valjakkala in Helsinki - Helsingin Sanomat
Naistuttava:
Järjestin Valjakkalalle pakopaikan - Iltalehti