npm annual report 2016 / observations and recommendations 3.6 Alien affairs Slightly less than 5,700 asylum seekers made their way to Finland in 2016. The year before, this figure was some 32,000. Some 28,200 asylum decisions were made, in 51% of which asylum was denied. Under section 121 of the Aliens Act, an asylum seeker may be held in detention for such reasons as establishing his or her identity or enforcing a decision to remove him or her from the country. There are two detention units for foreign nationals in Finland. Joutseno detention unit has 30 places, 10 of which are reserved for families, while The outdoor exercise yard at the detention unit of the Metsälä Unit has 40 places. As a reMetsälä reception centre operated by the City of Helsinki. sult of the high number of negative asylum decisions, the number of foreign nationals taken into custody may be expected to increase. The Finnish Immigration Service has responded to this need, and according to its report, 40 new places will be set up in Joutseno detention unit in 2017. This must be considered a positive development, as otherwise there would be pressures to hold foreign nationals in the detention facilities of the police, which are only suitable for very short-term detention. Some of the residents in reception centres and detention units may be victims of human trafficking, and recognising them is a challenge. The system of assistance for victims of human trafficking operates in connection with Joutseno reception centre. A press release from the Finnish Immigration Service relates that in 2016, the system of assistance received almost 2.5 times as many applications as the year before. Of the 130 new customers accepted to the system of assistance, 21 were minors. The year before, 52 new customers were accepted, all of whom were of age. The NPM’s target is to visit both detention units roughly once a year. The NPM visited Joutseno detention unit in 2015 and Metsälä unit in 2016. The visits were pre-announced in order to ensure that interpretors were available for the language groups of the persons held in custody at the time of the visit. The NPM interviewed several Russian, Arabic and Chinese speaking detainees with the assistance of interpreters. • At the time of the previous visit in 2014 the Ombudsman had recommended that, when necessary, Metsälä detention unit should carry out a routine check-up on foreign nationals who have been returned to the detention unit after a failed attempt to remove them from the country. Comment: On the most recent visit, the unit reported that after each failed attempt at removal from the country, the foreign national returned to the unit is offered a possibility of meeting a public health nurse. 43