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Finland PUBLIC ORDER AND SECURITY
Responsibility for law enforcement and for the
maintenance of
public security rested entirely with the central
government. No
police forces were maintained by lower levels of
government. The
minister of interior exercised control over all police
forces
through the Police Department, one of the departments of
the
Ministry of Interior. It functioned as the central command
unit
supervising the two types of ordinary police forces--town
police
and rural police--as well as three special police units,
the
Central Criminal Police (Keskusrikospoliisi--KRP), the
Mobile
Police (Liikkuva--LP), and the Security Police
(Suojelupoliisi--
SUPO). The total personnel complement of the police, as of
late
1988, was 8,341, of whom approximately 200 were women.
The RVL, a paramilitary force with responsibilities for
guarding Finland's borders and for maintaining public
order and
safety in frontier and coastal areas, was also under the
supervision of the minister of interior in peacetime. Its
headquarters was the Frontier Guard Department, a separate
division within the ministry. The personnel strength of
the RVL
was roughly half that of the police.
Data as of December 1988
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