Although hate crime figures have increased in recent years, violence like the two stabbings seen in Oulu recently remains rare.
That's according to researcher Jenita Rauta of the Police University College.
She says she does not recall a similar incident recently, where a person faced a violent attack in a public place because of their ethnic background.
"We're talking about a pretty exceptional case," said Rauta. "According to police statistics, there were 1,200 reports of suspected hate crimes in 2022, which is more than in the preceding few years. The number is similar to that recorded in 2015, when Finland saw a large influx of asylum seekers."
The attacks at the Valkea shopping centre in Oulu over the last week are suspected to have been racist in nature.
The suspect in the first stabbing was an Oulu man involved in far-right activism, who denies racism was a motive. The second attack is also initially being investigated as a possible racist incident.
Assaults most common
The most common motive for hate crimes is the victim's ethnic background.
Researcher Jenita Rauta said that assault is the most common offence among crimes classified as racist in motive. Often some provocation starts these incidents.
"Mostly it's a question of some group that starts shouting abuse at a group of darker skinned people, which then causes a fight," said Rauta.
More serious racist violence rarely comes to police attention, according to Rauta.
"Assaults include cases where people spit on or push other people," said Rauta. "Other crimes with a racist motive are things like illegal threats and slander."
According to Statistics Finland, there were around 350 hate crimes targeting the life or health of the victim last year. That is more than in any year since 2006.
According to the statistics, suspects in hate crimes are most commonly young white Finnish men. A majority of victims are Finnish citizens, but they come from different ethnic backgrounds.
Many Ukrainian victims
Researcher Rauta says that the increase in the number of cases is partly explained by the arrival of Ukrainians since the start of the full-scale Russian invasion in 2022.
Statistics show Ukrainian citizens were proportionately more likely than other ethnic groups to be targeted in 2022.
"We noticed that many Finns do not really differentiate between Ukrainians and Russians," said Rauta. "Ukrainians can speak Russian as their native language, and are victimised because they are thought to be Russian."
Hate crime under-reported
Rauta says that the threshold for reporting hate crimes has lowered in recent years, which is evident in the statistics.
Social media has also had an influence, especially in the statistics on threats and slander. Even so, many hate crimes go unreported.
Police estimate that only around 20 percent of all hate crime victims make a police report.
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