Chancellor clears police over decision not to investigate MP’s remarks

Finland’s Chancellor of Justice has found that Helsinki police acted lawfully when they decided not to open a preliminary investigation into remarks by MP Teemu Keskisarja, Yle reports.

Keskisarja, a Finns Party MP and the party’s first deputy chair, said on Yle’s A-studio programme in August 2025 that “population replacement” was happening and described immigrants as “mostly low-quality”.

A private individual complained to the Chancellor of Justice, arguing that police had already decided to investigate the remarks before transferring the case to another investigator, who concluded there was no reason to suspect a crime.

Helsinki police said a report based on several criminal complaints had been mistakenly sent directly to an investigative team. Once the error was identified, the matter was transferred to an investigator in the unit responsible for preliminary assessment. The officer initially assigned to the case had taken no action, police said.

Chancellor of Justice Janne Salminen said the information available gave him no grounds to find that the police inspector had acted unlawfully.

Prosecutor General Ari-Pekka Koivisto had already concluded in June that there was no need to order a preliminary investigation because he would probably not bring charges. Koivisto said Keskisarja had referred to immigrants’ educational, cultural and professional level, rather than innate or genetic characteristics. He said the remarks were generalising but were not made with the intention of insulting or treating immigrants as inferior, and did not deny their human worth. Koivisto also described some of the remarks as exaggerated.