All of the applications for asylum submitted by Romanian citizens of the Roma or Gipsy minority have been rejected, and the applicants are to be sent back to Romania.

   

Finnish officials found that the asylum applications lacked merit, and that the people in question were primarily economic migrants.

   

A total of 525 Romanians applied for asylum in Finland during the spring and summer, and many of them have already been sent back to Romania on two chartered flights.

   

In previous years groups Roma from various Central and Eastern European countries have arrived in Finland to apply for asylum here.