28 held during Elokapina protest at Helsinki Airport

Police detained 28 protesters during a demonstration organised by Elokapina (Extinction Rebellion Finland) at the Helsinki Airport on Saturday afternoon.

Police said that the protesters numbering 40 to 50 gathered at the Terminal 2 from 3:00 pm to 5:00 pm and about 30 of them temporarily created obstacle on way to check in of the passengers by laying down on the floor in front of the gate.

Police ordered the protesters to shift the location to a suitable place but 28 of them did not pay heed to the order prompting the law enforcers to arrest them, said police in a press release.

Police, however, said that two of the minor detainees were release immediately while the rest were scheduled to be released at midnight.

“Police did not receive any prior notice about the protest. You can hold demonstration at the public areas of Helsinki-Vantaa Airport, but police will show better place for demonstration, if it is held inside the airport or near entrance,” said Jere Pääkkönen, Chief Inspector of Eastern Uusimaa Police Department.

Extinction Rebellion Finland in a press release said that a total of 60 people staged demonstration inside the airport while 30 other people extended their support to the demonstration from outside.

For the first time in Finland, Extinction Rebellion demonstrated to disrupt the activities of the airport to press home their demands of destruction of life caused by aviation and the global and local injustice underlying it.

They demanded that the Finnish government include all aviation emissions from domestic and international flights into Finland’s emission reduction goals, from which they are currently excluded. They also demanded that Finland must reduce its air traffic and Finnair’s flights considerably.

Elokapina activists pointed out that there is still no tax on international flights or aviation fuel and that emissions from international flights are not counted as part of Finland’s emissions. Flying is also a socio-economic issue. Only just over a tenth of the world’s people fly, and the top 1% account for half of all aviation emissions. The lion’s share of flights in Finland are made for pleasure.

“I was protesting against the politics behind the artifially cheap price and growth of flights. Flying is infinitely damaging to our planet and this should be reflected in the price of flights. I don’t think it’s the fault of individuals, but of political and commercial activities that blind us to the environmental of flights”, said protester Wilhelm Blomberg.

“I would like to have peace of mind that the decision makers are making sustainable choices. This must also be the case for overconsumption. We can no longer outsource our emissions to countries where the commodities are produced and pretend to ignore the damage. We have a responsibility for the suffering caused by the climate crisis elsewhere as well. Flying and aviation are some of the harmful practices that politics allows”, said Elina Kauppila at the scene of the action.

The demonstration is part of Elokapina’s Overconsumption Uprising, in which the movement demands that consumption-based climate emissions be included in Finland’s emission reduction goals and that the use of natural resources and energy be reduced to sustainable levels.

Extinction Rebellion is a leaderless, decentralised, international and apolitical network using non-violent direct action and civil disobedience to persuade governments to act justly on the Climate and Ecological Emergency.