Two Finnish lawyers said in a report Friday that the country's head of state or prime minister could issue a statement labelling postwar trials of Finnish leaders as a breach of the rule of law.

The 1946 trials, which most Finns prefer to call "war responsibility trials" instead of the less palatable heading used by the allies, saw Risto Ryti, president in 1940-4, six wartime cabinet members and an ambassador jailed for waging war against the Soviet Union in 1941-4, a conflict known as the Continuation war in Finland.

The legal process was based on retroactive legislation.

Finland was an ally of Germany during the Continuation war, with more than 200,000 German troops fighting on the Finnish front.

In the report commissioned by the justice ministry, Jukka Lindstedt and Stiina Löytömäki underline that the trials constituted "a complex political process" during which a number of the principles of the rule of law were violated.

But the report adds that a law to lift the sentences as well as a public apology would be problematic courses of action.

The scholars went on to suggest "a symbolic gesture" like a statement by the president or the prime minister declaring the trials as incompatible with the rule of law.

The report highlights that similar treatment should be extended to other perversions of justice in the country's history, like the 1941-4 political trials.

STT