Finland’s far-right terror group plotted to assassinate Prime Minister Sanna Marin and start a race war after creating firearms using 3D printers, court hears
- Four men are on trial in Lahti on charges of planning terrorist acts and possession of firearms
A far-right terror group in Finland plotted to assassinate Prime Minister Sanna Marin and start a race war after creating firearms using 3D printers, a court has been told.
In Lahti, four men are on trial on charges of planning a terrorist act and possession of firearms. The times reports.
Police say the men followed “accelerationism” – the idea that capitalism or the processes it produces must be deepened or accelerated to bring about radical change.
The idea was linked to a wave of hate killings in the US, including the 2022 Buffalo shooting that left 10 black people dead.
The men are said to have made firearms using 3D printers. Raids on their properties revealed a list of targets including MPs, minority groups and anti-fascist activists.
Two of the defendants openly discussed Marin’s murder at an event in 2022. They shared information about her stay in their city on Telegram (file photo)
Two of the defendants openly discussed Marin’s murder during a Social Democratic Party event in Lahti in 2022. They shared information that she would appear on Telegram.
Under questioning, one of the men said: ‘The FGC-9 gun was within reach and I could have reached the Lahti market by car in less than ten minutes. At the same time I talked about these things on Telegram, that there would be a theoretical possibility of committing a political assassination.’
The FGC-9 is a 3D-printable pistol-caliber semi-automatic carbine.
The suspect stated that they were not sincerely involved in a terrorist attack because they did not go through with the plan.
He described the chat as “just banter” about how easy it would be to launch an attack on a Finnish head of state and said they were just blowing off steam and looking for extreme experiences.
However, he said he could have killed Marin if he wanted to, Finnish broadcaster YLE reported.
One defendant described the conversation between the two of them as “just banter” about how easy it would be to launch an attack on a Finnish head of state and said they were simply blowing off steam and looking for extreme experiences (File Photo)
One of the men is on trial for firearms offenses and the other three are charged with terrorism.
During the raids, officers also discovered the address of Maria Ohisalo, a former interior minister who headed the Green League party.
When asked who they targeted, one defendant replied that they considered the people enemies of “nationalists” and possible sources of information.
He said: ‘I am openly ethno-nationalist, I know where it leads when there are too many ethnicities in the same room. These ethnicities start to pursue their own interests as a group and that does not lead to anything good for the Finns. I had no plans to shoot people or anything though.”
Other locations targeted included the offices of the socialist party Left Alliance, a bookstore and vegan cafe run by volunteers and an alternative nightclub in the city of Tampere.
Detective Inspector Tuomas Kuure told YLE that the suspects had used terms related to acceleration in their messages, such as “race war” and “sedition.”