Wednesday November 27, 2024

Finland postpones deportation of Iraqi refugees

Published : 27 Oct 2018, 04:00

DF Report

Security personnel gather outside Erbil provincial government building at Erbil, Iraq, July 23, 2018. The Kurdish security forces on Monday killed three gunmen who broke into the provincial government building in Iraq's northern city of Erbil. File Photo Xinhua.

The Finnish authorities postponed all deportations of rejected Iraqi asylum seekers, National broadcaster Yle reported quoting a Swedish-language newspaper in Finland Huvudstadsbladet.

The police have suspended the deportations of Iraqi refugees since the beginning of October, said the report.

The police deported a total of 150 Iraqi asylum seekers this year.

Iraq, however, refused to sign an agreement with Finland on forced returns of the asylum seekers.

"Iraq has said that it will not accept anyone who has not voluntarily returned. For this reason, we are not deporting Iraqi nationals for the time being," said the Yle report quoting police inspector Ari Jokinen as saying.

Earlier, in September first week, the Finnish Immigration Service (Migri) postponed making decisions on asylum applications made by Afghan refugees and decided to re-evaluate its policy for Afghan asylum seekers following a new policy issued by the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR).

On August 29, the Finland Chapter of Amnesty International urged the Finnish authorities to refrain from deporting rejected Afghan asylum seekers.