Kai Aslak Mykkänen (born 31 July 1979) is a Finnish politician who currently serves as Mayor of

Espoo Espoo (, ; ) is a city in Finland. It is located to the west of the capital, Helsinki, in southern Uusimaa. The population is approximately . It is the most populous Municipalities of Finland, municipality in Finland. Espoo is part of the Helsi ...

. He served as Minister of the Environment and Climate Change. He is a former Minister of the Interior and represents the

National Coalition Party The National Coalition Party (NCP; , Kok; , Saml) is a liberal conservatism, liberal-conservative List of political parties in Finland, political party in Finland. It is the current governing political party of Finland. Founded in 1918, the ...

in the

Uusimaa Uusimaa (; , ; both lit. 'new land') is a region of Finland. It borders the regions of Southwest Finland, Tavastia Proper (Kanta-Häme), Päijänne Tavastia (Päijät-Häme), and Kymenlaakso. Finland's capital and largest city, Helsinki, alo ...

electoral district.

Early life

Mykkänen was born in

to the journalist and politician Jouni Mykkänen and Maria Mykkänen (née Sokolow). He is of Russian descent through his mother, who is a daughter of

Russian emigrants The Russian diaspora is the global community of ethnic Russians. The Russian-speaking (''Russophone'') diaspora are the people for whom Russian language is the native language, regardless of whether they are ethnic Russians or not. History ...

. His home language was mainly Finnish, but he also speaks fluent

Russian Russian(s) may refer to: *Russians (), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *A citizen of Russia *Russian language, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages *''The Russians'', a b ...

. He has worked three years in Russia.

Political career

Mykkänen was the chairman of the Coalition Party Youth League 2000–2001. He was a member of the City Council of Espoo 2001–2008. Mykkänen was elected to the Parliament of Finland in the

2015 election Africa * 2015 Beninese parliamentary election 26 April 2015 * 2015 Burkinabé general election 29 November 2015 * 2015 Burundian legislative election 29 June 2015 * 2015 Burundian presidential election 21 July 2015 * 2015-16 Central African g ...

with 5,260 votes. He was a member of the Environment Committee and Grand Committee from 2015 until 2016. On 22 June 2016, Mykkänen was appointed as the Minister for Foreign Trade and Development in the

cabinet Cabinet or The Cabinet may refer to: Furniture * Cabinetry, a box-shaped piece of furniture with doors and/or drawers * Display cabinet, a piece of furniture with one or more transparent glass sheets or transparent polycarbonate sheets * Filin ...

Prime Minister A prime minister or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. A prime minister is not the head of state, but r ...

Juha Sipilä Juha Petri Sipilä (; born 25 April 1961) is a Finnish politician who served as Prime Minister of Finland from 2015 to 2019. A relative newcomer to politics, he has a successful background in business. He was the leader of the Centre Party fr ...

after Lenita Toivakka's resignation. On 6 February 2018, Mykkänen shifted his portfolio in order to replace Paula Risikko as the

Minister of the Interior An interior minister (sometimes called a minister of internal affairs or minister of home affairs) is a cabinet official position that is responsible for internal affairs, such as public security, civil registration and identification, emergency ...

. In this capacity, he also co-chaired the Justice and Home Affairs Ministers Meeting of the

European People's Party The European People's Party (EPP) is a European political party with Christian democracy, Christian democratic, liberal conservatism, liberal-conservative, and conservative member parties. A transnational organisation, it is composed of other p ...

(EPP), alongside

Esteban González Pons Esteban González Pons (; born 21 August 1964) is a Spanish politician of the People's Party (Spain), People's Party (PP) who was a member of the European Parliament between 2014 and 2023. He was elected to the 15th Congress of Deputies from Val ...

. In June 2023, he was appointed Minister of the Environment and Climate Change in the Orpo Cabinet. Mykkänen will succeed

Jukka Mäkelä Jukka Mäkelä (born 7 July 1960 in Espoo) is a Finnish politician from the National Coalition Party and the current city manager/mayor of Espoo, the second largest city of Finland, since 1 January 2011.

as city manager of Espoo on 1 February 2025 when Mäkelä will go on retirement.

Other activities

World Bank The World Bank is an international financial institution that provides loans and Grant (money), grants to the governments of Least developed countries, low- and Developing country, middle-income countries for the purposes of economic development ...

, Ex-Officio Alternate Member of the Board of Governors (2016-2018)

Political positions

As Minister of the Interior, Mykkänen proposed in 2018 to increase Europe's quota refugee system ten-fold, for the EU to receive 250,000 new asylum seekers per year instead of the current 25,000. When the

Oulu child sexual exploitation scandal In December 2018, it transpired that adult men, all of whom had arrived in Finland as asylum seekers or refugees, were grooming, and raping and otherwise sexually abusing, girls under 15 years of age in Oulu, Finland. One victim ended up comm ...

broke out, Mykkänen said these things shouldn't be occurring in Finland and called for immigrants residing at reception centres to be educated.

Personal life

Mykkänen has two children with his wife Anna.

References

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External links

1979 births Living people People from Espoo Finnish people of Russian descent National Coalition Party politicians Government ministers of Finland Ministers of the interior of Finland Ministers of the environment of Finland Members of the Parliament of Finland (2015–2019) Members of the Parliament of Finland (2019–2023) Members of the Parliament of Finland (2023–2027) {{NationalCoalition-politician-stub