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Around 50 people travel from Finland to join jihad: media

Xinhua, January 23, 2015 Adjust font size:

Finnish police said approximately 50 people have traveled from Finland to conflict areas in Iraq and Syria for joining radical movements in the past year or so, reported Finnish national broadcaster Yle on Thursday.

According to the Finnish Security Intelligence Service, the some 50 persons joined the radical Islamic State (IS). About 20 have returned to Finland and 6 to 8 have died in conflicts.

Chief Inspector of Helsinki Police Department Jari Taponen told Yle that in recent months it has been also observed that the number of young women who are interested in radicalism is on the rise.

It is crucial to prevent people from traveling to the conflict zones, claimed Taponen.

However, preventative measures are extremely hard to implement because of the difficulties in identifying people who have intentions to join the "holy wars," the police officer added.

As many of the persons who have left to participate in jihad are from the capital region, the Helsinki Police Department is due to start a mentoring program in cooperation with several organizations to prevent radicalization in the coming autumn, said Yle. Endit