Fears of being locked out of US services have materialised, reports Kauppalehti.
Kauppalehti‘s editorial expresses concern about a US “kill switch” that would allow the American government to restrict the use of US-owned services abroad, whether in fighter jets or cloud platforms.
These fears have now materialised, according to the business daily.
Last week, the US administration ordered the AI company Anthropic to block access to its latest Mythos language model for foreign users, citing national security concerns.
The United States has previously imposed export controls on AI chips, but this marked the first time such rules were used to restrict access to language models themselves.
From Finland’s perspective, it is reassuring that the US does not appear, in this case, to have used the decision to single out its European allies.
Mumbai childhood
Helsingin Sanomat‘s most-read story investigates the unusual case of a 33-year-old Norwegian-Finnish man who says he spent much of his childhood on the streets of Mumbai after being effectively abandoned by his Nordic parents.
Lasse Lund told the paper he slept in temples and by the roadside, earning money as an informal guide for tourists.
He did not leave India until the age of 17, when assistance from the Finnish embassy finally enabled his departure.
The work of Finnish authorities is now in focus.
“If a Finnish child is left alone on the streets of India and the authorities fail to intervene, as appears quite clearly to have happened in this case, then it is difficult to argue that everything functioned as it should have,” Jussi Tanner, director general of the Foreign Ministry’s consular services, told HS.
Civil weddings dominate
Summer is wedding season. In Finland, an increasing share of couples are choosing to marry outside the church, according to Hufvudstadsbladet.
Last year, nearly 60 percent of all marriages tied the knot in civil ceremonies, compared with 40 percent in church weddings. Two decades ago, the proportions were reversed.
At an office complex in Pasila, Tanja Tams, who officiates civil unions, attributes the growing popularity of civil ceremonies to declining church membership. That assessment is echoed by Auli Hämäläinen, a senior statistician at Statistics Finland, who notes that younger generations are significantly less likely to belong to the church than their parents.
In 2025, a total of 22,082 marriages were registered in Finland. Among first-time marriages between opposite-sex couples, the average age at marriage was 32.6 for women and 34.4 for men.
