The Left Alliance and the Greens are now the only political parties in parliament which clearly oppose Finland withdrawing from the Ottawa Convention banning anti-personnel landmines, the news group Uutissuomalainen reports.
A survey of parliamentary party group leaders found that the National Coalition Party, the Finns Party, the Christian Democrats and Movement Now are in favour of withdrawing, while the Social Democrats and Swedish People's Party are willing to discuss the issue.
The Centre Party did not respond to the question.
However, Ilta-Sanomat points out that the Centre Party's chair, Antti Kaikkonen, told the party newspaper Suomenmaa at the weekend that anti-personnel mines must be re-evaluated if the Finnish Defence Forces (FDF) demand it.
The debate on anti-personnel landmines was reopened at the weekend by the FDF's commander, General Janne Jaakkola. He told Finnish news outlet MTV the changed security environment is now different from when Finland joined the Ottawa Treaty in 2011.
Prime Minister Petteri Orpo (NCP) told Iltalehti on Sunday that the nation's foreign policy leadership is discussing the land mine issue. Defence Minister Antti Häkkänen (NCP) said on Monday that he launched a study on the need for anti-personnel mines already this past summer.
The government is currently finalising its latest defence policy report. The report is due to be submitted to Parliament during before the end of the year.
More resources for police
This past autumn, the government decided to increase the budget for the Interior Ministry by 19 million euros, of which around 11 million will be allocated to the police, in particular to fight street gangs, juvenile crime and the grey economy.
The additional resources are expected to be allocated to police departments in the capital region and in Central Finland.
Hämeen Sanomat is among the papers reporting that the number of police officers is expected to increase by just under 60 members next year.
Additional personnel have already been recruited for operational police tasks, in particular for criminal investigations, and operations targeting gang crime and cybercrime.
According to preliminary estimates, 310 new police officers will graduate from Finland's Police University College this year and 250 next year. The number of openings for police training was increased to 500 this year, up by 100 over previous years.
Over 100,000 foreign students
The news agency STT takes up figures published by the Finnish Education Employers organization (FEE) showing that there were more than 114,000 foreign students studying in the country last year.
The number of foreign students in vocational and other higher education and has doubled since 2014 and tripled since 2009. The number of foreign children and pupils has also increased in both early childhood education and other forms of primary and secondary education.
"The fastest growth has been in vocational education and training, where there were over 40,000 foreign students last year. The internationalisation trend is positive and necessary, as Finland needs immigration for work and education," FEE Managing Director Susanna Niinistö-Sivuranta said in a release.
The number of international teaching staff also increased at all levels of education during the past year, according to the FEE report.
Home purchase discounts
The new housing market remains stagnant, new houses and flats are selling poorly and builders are now more willing to negotiate discounts on list prices, reports Helsingin Sanomat.
According to the paper, there are more than 3,000 new homes for sale in the capital region.
Among the sellers interviewed by HS was Markus Heino, CEO of JM Finland, who said that right now it is difficult to sell new homes without negotiating over price.
According to Heino, how much can be cut from list prices is a case-by-case matter, depending on factors such as overall supply in the area.
"Some discounts are very small, others can be more than 10 percent," he told HS.
JM Finland has also adjusted its list prices, but Heino added that it is unlikely that the market will see big price reductions.
There are already small signs of an upturn in the market for older homes, and Heino said he believes this will soon be reflected in the new housing market, as well.
Cold and colder up north
A new record low temperature for this early winter season is possible in Lapland on Wednesday night or early Thursday morning.
The coldest temperature so far this season was -22.5 Celsius on 21 November in Utsjoki in the far north of Finnish Lapland.
A forecast carried by Iltalehti looks to chilling daytime temperatures in Lapland this week of 10-20 degrees below zero.
According to Foreca weather service meteorologist Joonas Koskela, if skies remain clear, part of Lapland may see the thermometer dip down as low as -25 Celsius overnight.
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