Confronting the challenges posed by the war in Ukraine, continuing discrimination (despite some progress) against LGBTI people, Roma and Travellers, and the need to combat hate speech and to support civil society players are the main themes of the 2022 report from the Council of Europe’s European Commission against Racism and Intolerance (ECRI), published on Thursday 1 June.
This report highlights the “generally satisfactory reception” given by European countries to people fleeing Ukraine after the outbreak of war, but deplores the “unequal treatment” inflicted on people of African or Asian heritage and Roma people who are Ukrainian nationals, particularly at borders, both in Ukraine and in host countries.
ECRI is calling for effective investigations into the reports received.
Another consequence of the war was that hundreds of thousands of Russians left their country to take refuge in Council of Europe member states where they did not need an entry visa.
ECRI welcomes the authorities’ swift action to disperse hostile demonstrations against these Russian immigrants and silence the associated hate speech, but stresses that “extra vigilance is required in this area”.
The situation of LGBTI people in Europe remains very uneven and sometimes very worrying, notes ECRI, which is committed to adopting a general policy recommendation in 2023 on intolerance, discrimination and hate speech affecting these people.
In the face of antigypsyism, which remains active in Europe, ECRI is calling for measures to be taken, particularly in the area of police violence: “States should make further efforts to organise police training, recruit mediators between Roma and the police, as well as Roma police officers”.
ECRI also deplores the “shrinking space in which civil society actors are left to operate in some countries”.
The authorities have made registration procedures for NGOs more cumbersome, imposed additional taxes and unjustified fines, and tightened regulations on foreign funding.
In addition, cases of intimidation and stigmatisation of civil society actors by political leaders have been reported, while hate speech legislation in these countries does not include grounds of religion, sexual orientation or gender identity, ECRI deplores.
On 31 May, on the eve of the report’s publication, Maria Daniella Marouda, Chair of ECRI, stressed the importance of meeting all these challenges, building on the Declaration adopted at the last Council of Europe Summit, held in Reykjavik in May.
The Heads of State and Government made a political commitment to defend “an inclusive society, free from racism and intolerance”.
Link to ECRI’s 2022 Report: https://aeur.eu/f/76k (Original version in French by Véronique Leblanc)