大象传媒

It's been described as a total collapse of the centre. The True Finns, a nationalist party, has taken nearly a fifth of votes in Finland's general election. The True Finns finished just behind the conservative NCP and the Social Democrats on around 19%.

Although they haven't won enough seats to becoming the ruling party, the strong showing for the True Finns means the anti-euro party will at least "get an invitation to talks" on a new government.

ErkoRintala tweets,
Goodbye international,open,modern Finland.Welcome to the dark ages where nobody different is accepted.Sad day for my dear Finland.
But across Europe their strong showing could have wider implications. While the Social Democrats have called for changes on EU bail-outs, including the planned Portuguese rescue, True Finns opposes the plans altogether and could re challenge Europe's plans to rescue debt-ridden economies.

Theoretically a hostile Finnish government could veto the package because unlike other eurozone countries, Finland's parliament can vote on whether to approve the measures.

Is it protest vote? This article says yes, it's a concious move by Finnish voters to protest at eurozone bailouts for EU "squanderers" in Greece, Ireland and Portugal.

Carl Bildt, the Swedish Foreign Minister has tweeted,
There is reason to be worried by the big gains of the nationalist populist in Finnish election. We wish a Finland that's Nordic & European.
We'll be talking to Finns about what this means for their country and the wider impact on Europe.

Plus we're inviting a number of bloggers onto the programme to talk about what is being discussed where they are in the world. Here's a couple of them

Charlie Custer, compiles list of most talked about topics on Chinese internet called the Baidu Beat and Jon Worth, writes a European politics blog