Simon Ekpa Credit: Yle
A Finnish Court of Appeal has reduced the prison sentence of Biafra separatist agitator Simon Ekpa from six years to four years while upholding his convictions for terrorism-related offences.
In its judgment on Thursday, the court upheld Ekpa’s conviction for participating in the activities of a terrorist group and publicly inciting people to commit crimes with terrorist intent.
The court, however, reduced his sentence after finding that the circumstances surrounding the offences closely resembled those that could justify exemption from criminal liability, including civil war, self-defence and necessity.
Ekpa, 41, has been in custody since his arrest in Finland in November 2024. He had appealed the September 2025 judgment of the Päijät-Häme District Court, which sentenced him to six years in prison. Prosecutors also appealed, seeking a harsher sentence.
According to the appeal court’s statement, the prosecution had argued that Ekpa operated from Lahti, Finland, as the supreme commander of several armed groups in South-eastern Nigeria.
The groups allegedly sought to establish an independent Biafran state, with their members carrying out attacks on police stations, government buildings and military roadblocks to achieve that objective.
The appeal court said it examined the same evidence presented by the prosecution and reached the same conclusions as the district court regarding Ekpa’s activities.
During the appeal, however, Ekpa presented new evidence in support of his argument that a non-international armed conflict existed in South-Eastern Nigeria.
He argued that international humanitarian law, rather than Finland’s national terrorism laws, should apply to his activities, which he said were connected to the conflict and lacked terrorist intent.
The court consequently examined the nature of the conflict, the organisation of the armed groups and the intensity of the fighting, comparing the evidence with assessments of the Balkan wars by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia.
It found that evidence of Nigerian government forces deploying heavy weapons, including armoured vehicles and combat helicopters, supported the argument that an internal armed conflict existed.
The organisation and equipment of the armed groups also lent some support to that position, the court said.
However, it ruled that the intensity of the fighting fell short of the threshold required under international case law for classification as a civil war.
The court noted that the clashes largely involved isolated attacks on police stations and road checkpoints. It said there was insufficient evidence that the armed groups led by Ekpa could sustain military operations requiring strategic planning, prolonged fighting and continuity of operations.
The absence of reports of significant civilian displacement from the affected areas also weighed against classifying the situation as a civil war.
Although the court rejected Ekpa’s argument that the conflict removed terrorist intent from his actions, it considered the circumstances relevant to determining his punishment.
It therefore reduced his sentence under Chapter 6, Section 8(1), paragraph 4 of Finland’s Criminal Code, while maintaining his convictions for the two terrorism-related offences.
The court’s statement said Ekpa had also been convicted of two other crimes by the district court, but those convictions were no longer under review in the appeal.
The case was decided by Judges Aki Rasilainen and Antti Santaranta, alongside Assistant Judge Johanna Puukka.
