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Sarah Dzafce lost her Miss Finland crown last week after a photo of Dzafce pulling the skin at the corners of her eyes posted on social media went viral late last month. The photo, and its caption reading \u201ceating with a Chinese,\u201d was decried by governments and commentators across Finland and Asia as discrimination against Asians. <\/p>\n
Dzafce, who won Miss Finland in September, has told Finnish media that she was trying to alleviate a headache. The Helsinki Times<\/a><\/span> reported that she said a friend had shared the private image and wrote the caption without her input. Dzafce did not respond to The Associated Press\u2019s request for comment Thursday.<\/p>\n Dzafce posted an apology to social media on Dec. 8 and said it was never her intention to hurt anyone.<\/p>\n \u201cThe Miss Finland title is not just a crown for me, but also a responsibility. A responsibility for how I speak, how I act, and how my actions can affect people,\u201d she wrote in Finnish. <\/p>\n She added: \u201cI take responsibility for my actions and will learn from this.\u201d<\/p>\n Days later, the Miss Finland Organization revoked her status as Miss Finland 2025 \u2014 known as Miss Suomi in Finnish.<\/p>\n \u201cThe events of recent days have caused deep hurt, disappointment, and concern both in Finland and internationally \u2014 fully understandably,\u201d the organization wrote on social media. \u201cWe are deeply sorry for the harm these events have caused. Especially to the Asian community, but also to everyone affected. Racism is never acceptable in any form.\u201d<\/p>\n The controversy snowballed when several far-right Finnish politicians rallied around Dzafce after she lost her crown. Members of the parliament who are part of the ruling coalition posted their own photos of them pulling the skin around their eyes.<\/p>\n The furor has spread throughout Asia, prompting Finnish Prime Minister Petteri Orpo to issue an apology to several countries, including Japan<\/a><\/span> and South Korea<\/a><\/span>, through statements in their languages posted to Finnish embassy social media accounts.<\/p>\n \u201cThese posts do not reflect Finland\u2019s values of equality and inclusion,\u201d Orpo\u2019s statement said. \u201cRacism and discrimination have no place in Finnish society. Our message in Finland and to all our friends abroad is that the Government takes racism seriously and is committed to combat the issue. Finland always aims to do better. Politicians have a responsibility to serve as examples in this respect.\u201d<\/p>\n Japan\u2019s government has reached out to the Finnish embassy in Tokyo expressing its concerns. <\/p>\n Chief Cabinet Secretary Minoru Kihara, the government\u2019s top spokesperson, said Japan hopes to maintain close communication with Helsinki.<\/p>\n \u201cI understand that Finnish Prime Minister issued a statement expressing his deepest apology for the recent insulting posts made on social media by some parliamentarians,\u201d Kihara said. \u201cAs the Japanese government, we have conveyed via the local embassy our concern about the case and expectations for an appropriate response.\u201d<\/p>\n Finland is a major tourist destination for visitors from Asia, and some users on social platform X have called for a boycott of travel to Finland and of Finnair, the country\u2019s largest airline.<\/p>\n P\u00e4ivyt Tallqvist, the airline\u2019s senior vice president of communications, told Finnish broadcaster Yle<\/a><\/span> that the scandal has hurt the company\u2019s international operations without providing details.\n <\/div>\n window.fbAsyncInit = function() { };<\/p>\n (function(d, s, id){ HELSINKI, Finland (AP) \u2014 Finland\u2019s government is facing heavy pressure and accusations of racism from several Asian countries after its representative to the 2025 Miss Universe pageant was seen pulling the corners of her eyes in a photo — and some Finnish politicians posted their own photos repeating the gesture. Sarah Dzafce lost her Miss … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13799,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13798","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/A-photo-of-Miss-Finland-sparks-racist-accusations-and-furor.com2Fc32F1f2Febe06fa7c2880b29b4ca51f7ec572Fbd138fe956f44eeb8434.jpeg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13798","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13798"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13798\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13800,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13798\/revisions\/13800"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/13799"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13798"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13798"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13798"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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