A Finnish appellate court upheld the terrorism-related convictions of Biafra separatist agitator Simon Ekpa while reducing his prison sentence to four years.
In its Thursday decision, the court sustained Ekpa’s conviction on charges of participating in terrorist group activities and publicly inciting others to commit crimes with terrorist intent.
However, the court reduced the prison term after concluding that the context of the offenses shared similarities with circumstances that might warrant exemptions from criminal accountability, such as necessity, self-defense, or civil war conditions.
The 41-year-old agitator has remained in custody since his arrest in Finland in November 2024, having appealed the September 2025 verdict from the Päijät-Häme District Court that resulted in a six-year prison sentence. Prosecutors also filed an appeal seeking a harsher penalty.
According to the appellate court’s statement, prosecutors alleged that Ekpa operated from Lahti, Finland, serving as the supreme commander for multiple armed factions in southeastern Nigeria.
Members of these groups reportedly targeted military checkpoints, police stations, and government facilities in pursuit of establishing an independent Biafran republic.
The appeal court noted that upon reviewing the same evidence submitted by the prosecution, it reached the same factual conclusions as the district court.
However, Ekpa offered fresh proof during the appeal to back up his claim that there was a non-international armed conflict in South-Eastern Nigeria.
He maintained that his actions should be governed by international humanitarian law rather than Finland’s domestic terrorism laws because they were related to the conflict and did not have terrorist intent.
Backstory…
On September 1 2025, a District Court in Finland has sentenced the self-proclaimed leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra Government in Exile, Simon Ekpa, to six years in prison for terrorism-related crimes.
According to reports, Simon Ekpa was taken into custody by Finnish authorities on November 21, 2024, after the Finnish National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) looked into claims that he had used social media to incite terrorism and promote violence, actions that were thought to have fuelled unrest in southeast Nigeria
The indictment against Ekpa was based on “public incitement to commit a crime with terrorist intent,” which included alleged offences from August 2021 to November 2024, according to the Päijät-Häme District Court, which remanded him in detention after his arrest.
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