page_title: Finland
section_title: Human rights
hierarchical_section_title: Finland / Politics / Human rights
caption_attribution_description: People gathering at Senaatintori before the parade started.
context_page_description: Finland, officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country located in Northern Europe. Finland shares land borders with Sweden to the west, Russia to the east, and Norway to the north and is defined by the Gulf of Bothnia to the west and the Gulf of Finland to the south that are part of the Baltic Sea. Finland has a population of approximately 5.5 million, making it the 25th-most populous country in Europe. With an area of 338,455 square kilometres, Finland is the eighth-largest country in Europe, and the most sparsely populated country in the European Union. Helsinki, the capital of Finland, is the largest city in the country.
  Finland is a parliamentary republic consisting of 19 regions and 310 municipalities. The archipelago of the Åland Islands located southwest of the mainland is the only autonomous region of Finland. The climate in Finland varies due to the country's relatively vast latitudinal differences; southern Finland is classified as having a humid continental climate with the rest of the country being characterised by a boreal climate. Finland can be considered to have a mainly boreal forest biome.
context_section_description: § 6 in two sentences of the Finnish Constitution states: "No one shall be placed in a different position on situation of sex, age, origin, language, religion, belief, opinion, state of health, disability or any other personal reason without an acceptable reason."
  Finland has been ranked above average among the world's countries in democracy, press freedom, and human development.
  Amnesty International has expressed concern regarding some issues in Finland, such as alleged permitting of stopovers of CIA rendition flights, the imprisonment of objectors to military service, and societal discrimination against Romani people and members of other ethnic and linguistic minorities.
caption: People gathering at the Senate Square, Helsinki, right before the 2011 Helsinki Pride parade started.
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