Prosecutors in Oulu have filed charges in relation to the first of two stabbing incidents at the city's Valkea shopping centre, which occurred within the space of a few days in June.
Juhani Sebastian Lämsä, known to have a neo-Nazi background and an extensive criminal record, was charged with two counts of attempted murder as well as one count of making an illegal threat.
The case be brought to trial at Oulu District Court next month.
According to the prosecutor, the suspect has confessed to committing the crimes, although Lämsä was not mentioned by name in the press release.
According to the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI), Lämsä stabbed a 12-year-old boy of foreign background in the shopping centre on 13 June, seriously wounding the child. He also attempted to stab a 14-year-old boy immediately afterwards, before being subdued by a member of the public as well as security staff.
In a separate case, a teenager is suspected of stabbing and injuring a man of foreign background in an apparent copycat attack, outside the same shopping centre just a few days later.
The pre-trial investigation into that attack is still ongoing.
The two incidents shocked the foreign community in Oulu.
Police suspect racist motive
According to investigators, both attacks were racially motivated. However, the prosecutor's press release did not mention a possible motive in the first stabbing.
During interviews with police Lämsä denied that he committed the crimes or that there was any racial motivation. However, he was a former key member of the Nordic Resistance Movement (PVL), a banned neo-Nazi group. Additionally, he has been convicted of violent crimes and has a background in right-wing extremism.
According to Yle's information, Lämsä is also facing separate charges of reckless endangerment of the life or health of another person, related to an incident in which a suspected explosive device was delivered to a Posti service point in March 2021.