Finland

Comrades from Punalippu write on the meeting between President Niinistö of Finland and NATO General Secretary Stoltenberg (who is also former prime minister of Norway), as part of a three day visit to Sweden and Finland, the meeting regarding cooperation between Finland and NATO, which together with Sweden has never been formally part of NATO, but has recently supported it very closely. From the Finnish President, there was a intention of a stronger line towards Russia and China Stoltenberg restated the invitation for Finland to join NATO, and stated that: "Together, we make the Euro-Atlantic region more secure and more stable, including through NATO's enhanced forward presence in the Baltic region, our air policing mission and of course Finland's commitment to its national defence,". The comrades from Punalippu end their article with: “True internationalists oppose the partnership between Finland and NATO, as it means participating in the division of imperialist robbery, fattening Finnish financial capital, with the blood of the oppressed nations.”

Three journalists from the largest Finnish bourgeois newspaper “Helsingin Sanomat”, are standing trial and possible facing years of prison, for “exposing state secrets”. They exposed how the Finnish Military Intelligence Service has been conducting systematic surveillance and breaking article 10 of the Finnish constitution regarding letter and telephony secrecy. Was the crime that they leaked information from an inside source? No, the article was made using public sources and therefore the “exposing of state secrets” can only in regards to the investigative work they themselves did. Right after the article was published in 2017, one of the journalists was presented with a house search, where they took a PC and USB-drives. The purpose of this trial is clearly to stop other journalists from making investigations that are too critical of the state, even if they are found not-guilty, the years-long trial should be enough for sending a strong signal to journalists working in the confines of Finnish imperialism, not to bite the hand that feeds them.

Norway

Comrades from Tjen Folket Media write on the effects of the current energy shortage and increasing prices on food and other produce, and the effect of the high inflation rate, which was 4,1% in September. The comrades conclude the article: “Shortly summarized this is a new leap in the development we described earlier, where in Europe generally and specifically in Norway, see that a larger part of the population becomes poorer. Within the people the proportion of the Proletariat is rising, and the poorest of these also grow relatively. This economic and social foundation will again prepare the ground for sharpened class-struggle. We also underline that what happens here and now, is that the working people must pay for the crisis of capitalism, and that the coming boom will be thinned out especially among the poorest parts of the people, especially in the third world.”

Denmark

Prime minister of Denmark Mette Frederiksen, has in a meeting of the foreign council in the parliament, made a statement on the future of danish imperialist military intervention abroad. What is important, though unsurprising, is the increased cooperation with US-imperialism, in line with the meeting the week before between the foreign ministers of both countries. She also stated wanting to stay in “the heart of the EU”, but denying wanting more development of an EU-lead military. Many of the imperialist powers in the EU used the opportunity of the embarrassing NATO withdrawal from Afghanistan, to criticize US-imperialism and its role in leading NATO, but Frederiksen expressed sympathy for the complexity of the situation, a clear signal of being contempt with its role as a faithful accomplice of the plans of US-imperialism. The speech specifically mentioned Asia, and she did not hide that it is because of what US-imperialism has planned, not ruling out engaging in the South-China Sea and that the explicit goal is countering Russia and China. The most repeated phrase she has made to this regard has been, we “must keep our hand on the stove” and she wants to bring forward increasing GDP military spending to 2%, as dictated by US-imperialism, to the table at the next budget negotiations.

There is increased contention between the parliament and government, the struggle between different factions of the bourgeoisie of control of the state. Mette Frederiksen who is in charge of the government, has strengthened the power of the executive significantly during the “corona-crisis”. Both increased power of the government over the parliament and increased power of the prime ministry over the other ministries. Now the other bourgeois parties are lashing back, using the case of the “mink scandal”, when with very short notice the entirety of all minks were killed, due to apparent concerns of a new “super mink-corona variant”, by ministerial order. Minks are a large industry in Denmark for producing expensive furs. There is contention over whether or not there was a legal basis for it, and an official investigation is underway to determine the responsibility. The investigation gives some insight into the inner workings of the government, especially of the head bureaucrat of the prime ministry Barbara Bertelsen, who communicates the will of the Prime Minister to the other ministries. For example she called for the produce minister (who had formal responsibility for the minks) to take all responsibility for the “mink-scandal” and sent and SMS stating “when will you communicate (and lie down and roll over, like we discussed ;)”, “Just rip off the band-aid ;)” and even more bizarrely “Vanity is a deadly sin ;) Sleep well!”, the produce minister was shortly thereafter blamed and deposed for not taking all responsibility.