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Henri Vanhanen wrote that the Ilta-Sanomat news about Jaakko Laakso's communication with the Turkish foreign minister reminded him of his trip to Ankara with Mika Aaltola in February 2023. Vanhanen said they had discussed at that time the obstacles and opportunities regarding Finland's NATO membership ratification. Vanhanen stated that based on their assessments from the discussions, Turkey was clearly more positive towards Finland's membership than Sweden's, and that a separate pathway could be opened for Finland. They had made their assessment public and raised the possibility that Finland could advance if necessary before Sweden. According to Vanhanen, the assessment turned out to be correct. He noted that at that time they were not aware that Laakso had already met with the Turkish foreign minister the previous spring and expressed his opposition to Finland's NATO membership. Vanhanen wrote that Laakso's actions raised serious questions: in his view, opposing NATO membership was the right of every Finn, but conveying anti-membership views directly to the Turkish foreign minister was a different matter. Vanhanen believed that the events related to Finland's NATO membership deserved clarification, especially when they raised difficult questions about Finnish actions. https://t.co/XGptAqzYmF #Suomi #Nato #Turkki (translated)

Alpo Rusi wrote that Finland fought alongside Germany as a co-combatant in its own cause from 1941 to 1944 and also mentioned our country's Jews. According to him, it would have been brave for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to arrange a similar lighting for the Naval Barracks building. #Suomi #historia #toivo (translated)

Dennis Mitzner criticized the foreign minister's statement, in which he said that Finland is strongly committed to a two-state solution. Mitzner questioned whether the mention was necessary and believed it placed the statement, along with the mentioned 1,200 murdered Israeli citizens, in a political context that weakened the statement. He wondered whether Hamas would have started the attack even if the Gaza Strip, which it governs, had been part of an independent Palestine. According to Mitzner, the attack could have been even broader and targeted Israel's largest settlement centers from the West Bank. #Suomi #Palestina #IsraelinKriisi (translated)

Jari Mäkäräinen criticized Timo R. Stewart's column, stating that Stewart had already decided in advance that those who disagree are stupid and racist. According to Mäkäräinen, Stewart defined racism as evaluating individuals based on their ethnic or religious background and concluded that such individuals had nothing useful to say about international politics. Mäkäräinen mentioned that the column likened the observation of group differences to climate denialism, young Earth creationism, vaccine resistance, and reptilians. He also claimed that it had asserted that the Finnish media, researchers, and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs had adopted their Middle Eastern stance from Hamas. Mäkäräinen argued that the claim about the absence of pure races did not refute the phenomena indicated by statistics, attitude surveys, and street views. He highlighted religion, cousin marriages, concepts of honor, fertility, and renouncement of religion, adding that the common goals of Muslims could be examined from their own polls. According to Mäkäräinen, explaining unpleasant phenomena solely with prejudices and labeling dissenters as racists was essentialism. He criticized a sense of moral superiority and argued that it led to a lack of fact-checking, distinguishing between immigrant groups, or noticing that one's own media repeated Hamas's casualty figures. He believed that placing morality above observations weakened empathy. https://t.co/dglVfEEw2o #rasismi #media #ilmasto (translated)

SDP antaa epäluottamuksellaan vaikutelman, että Lähi-idän kysymykset menevät Suomen etujen edelle. SDP:n 1. varapuheenjohtaja Nasima Razmyar on sanonut, että mahdollisen SDP-vetoisen hallituksen ensimmäinen suuri ulkopoliittinen teko olisi Palestiinan valtion tunnustaminen. Samaan aikaan Suomen puolustusministerin tärkein tehtävä on vahvistaa Suomen ja suomalaisten turvallisuutta. Ei ajaa Lähi-idän konfliktin osapuolten asiaa. Suomen ulko- ja turvallisuuspolitiikan lähtökohtana pitää olla Suomen etu – ei se, mikä kulloinkin palvelee SDP:n agendaa. Tekikö vasemmisto vastaavaa älämölöä, kun ulkoministeri Elina Valtonen tapasi viime vuonna New Yorkissa Iranin ulkoministerin? Saako valtiojohto pitää yhteyksiä Venäjään rauhan edistämiseksi? Diplomatia ei tarkoita hyväksyntää. Yhteydenpito ei tarkoita liittolaisuutta. Maailma ei ole mustavalkoinen. Politiikka on yhteisten asioiden hoitamista, myös epämukavien ja vaikeiden. Jos ulko- ja turvallisuuspolitiikkaa tehdään niin, että joidenkin valtioiden kanssa ”ei leikitä”, koska emme hyväksy niiden politiikkaa, emme enää harjoita diplomatiaa. On myös syytä kysyä, miksi juuri Israelin kohdalla yhteydenpito ja diplomatia herättävät näin voimakkaan epäluottamuksen hallitukselle. Jos samoja periaatteita ei sovelleta muihin valtioihin, kyse voi olla kaksoisstandardista – ja Israelin kohdalla myös antisemitismistä. #Ulkopolitiikka #Diplomatia #Turvallisuus

Rahaa tulvii puljulle kuin sadetta Esterille. Nuorisoala ry ei julkaise tilinpäätöksiään. Tutki avustuksia -sivulta kuitenkin selviää, että v. 2024-2026 sille on myönnetty avustuksia yht. 5,6 milj €. Avustuksia ovat jakaneet valtioneuvoston kanslia, OKM, opetushallitus, STEA, ulkoministeriö, Keski-Suomen ELY-keskus ja Kaakkois-Suomen elinvoimakeskus. EU-tuet eivät rekisterissä näy. 3/6 #avustukset #nuorisoala #tilinpäätös