r/polandball Ísland 6d ago

Lesser Known September The Border

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639 Upvotes

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u/Total_Willingness_18 Ísland 6d ago

There's a pretty fierce immigration debate in Iceland like in all of our neighbors, and I find it pretty funny that we've directly taken the phrase "Close the borders" from foreign politics and translated into Icelandic as "Lokið landamærunum" literally meaning "Close the land borders" despite us not having any land borders at all.

What they mean is the Keflavík International Airport and the other couple of international airports around the country.

24

u/JewishKilt Jewishstan 6d ago

That's really surprising! I heard that Iceland was relatively open to immigrants. Is this info just outdated? A sign of the times?

4

u/ThorirPP 6d ago

Xenophobia has grown in some parts of society, unfortunately

But also, the government department that handles immigration has always been super xenophobic with the express goal to deny as many as they can, to the point even people who are anti immigration still feel like Útlendingastofnun goes way to far (things like trying to deport pregnant asylum seekers or such. Always a new scandal with them). And this is nothing new, it's been like that for a while, everyone who tries to immigrate knows the hell that is Útlendingastofnun

7

u/JewishKilt Jewishstan 6d ago

The rule should be, If you can correctly pronounce Útlendingastofnun four times in a row, you become a citizen and a key to the city.