Pelkosenniemi

Pelkosenniemi [ˈpɛlkɔsɛnːiɛmi] in Eastern Lapland is a municipality in the Finnish Lapland landscape, i.e. the part of Lapland that lies in Finland. It is located about 140 km northeast of its capital Rovaniemi and is the smallest municipality in this landscape, being the only one with less than 1000 inhabitants.

Pelkosenniemi still had 1601 inhabitants in 1980, since then this number has steadily decreased. Of the 958 inhabitants at the end of 2017, 358 lived in the main town of Pelkosenniemi and 563 in sparsely populated areas; the coordinates of the remaining 37 were unknown.

The commune is located on the state road . From south to north are located there (bold: place in the municipality):

• Kiemunkivaara, just beyond the Kemijärvi municipal boundary. The road runs upstream parallel to the Kemijoki River.
• Saunavaara, one of the oldest villages in the municipality.
• the fork of a road westward to the village of Pyhäjärvi, 13 km away, on the lake of the same name. Halfway there is Korvakumpu. South of it, the village of Saukkoaapa was founded in 1951, but abandoned already in the 1970s.
• In Pelkosenniemi, the main village of the municipality, there is the only bridge over Kemijoki. Across it, a road leads to the neighboring municipality of Salla via Arvospuoli, which lies on the river opposite Saunavaaran. The centers of the neighboring municipalities are 80 kilometers apart.
• Lapinniementie is an inconspicuous road that ends after 400 meters at the confluence of the Kitinen River with the Kemijoki River. From at least 1910 to 1964, there was a hand-operated wooden ferry across the Kitinen here, which was replaced by a bridge in 1965. Over it, the connection led east along the Kemijoki. Today, the bridge stands one kilometer to the north.
• which leads from here upstream parallel to the river Kitinen.
• the junction of the road leading east to the neighboring municipality of Savukoski
• Kairala is located on both sides of the Kitinen River, connected by a bridge. A road to the east leads to Luiro, 8 km away, on the river of the same name Luiro
• In Kokkosniva a bridge leads across the Kitinen, after that the river and the road separate. An upstream side road leads past the [Kitinen#HydroelectricPowerStation|Kokkosniva Hydroelectric Power Station] back in a southerly direction and after 10 kilometers reaches the village of Suvanto, one of the few villages in Lapland that were not destroyed during the retreat of the German Wehrmacht in 1944. The bridge from there further south was built in 1991, before that there was a wooden rope ferry, the oldest known photo is from 1914.
• Aapajärvi, named after the bog lake of the same name, consists of only a few scattered houses and was mostly settled only after World War II. A twelve-kilometer road to the northeast leads to Härkäjoki.
• the municipal border with Sodankylä.

In the southwestern part of the municipality, accessed by the , are the 540-meter-high Pyhätunturi Fell, on the western slope of which amethyst is dug, and the Pyhä Ski Center at the foot of the mountain. Both are part of the Pyhä-Luosto National Park.

In the east of the municipality, the Vuotos reservoir was planned as early as the 1960s, was rejected after protests in 1982, and was supposedly permanently prevented by the 1983 Rapids Protection Act. After the 1991 election, a bourgeois-conservative government came to power, and planning was resumed. Bitter resistance from the population, changing government positions and constant reprisals from the four-fifths state-owned power plant company had turned the project into a "national trauma," wrote the Finnish Hufvudstadsbladet in 2000. The last plan for implementation in 2008 by Economy Minister Mauri Pekkarinen of the Centre Party was halted because of opposition from the Green Party, then a government partner. The area to be flooded was still inhabited by 150 people in the 1950s and was almost cleared by the turn of the millennium.

During the Winter War, Pelkosenniemi was the scene of fierce fighting between the Finnish and Red armies at the Battle of Salla in December 1939; monuments commemorate those killed on both sides.