RACIST VIOLENCE IN 15 EU MEMBER STATES - Cospe

RACIST VIOLENCE IN 15 EU MEMBER STATES - A Comparative Overview of Findings from the RAXEN NFP Reports 2001-2004
national identity has not promoted an atmosphere of tolerance. On the other hand,
the reliance by mainstream politicians on nationalist rhetoric has served to
marginalise extreme right-wing groups whose policies on immigration and
refugees are forced to become, in the words of RAXEN 4, increasingly ‘ridiculous’
in an effort to compete with the mainstream.
However, some populist right-wing/nationalist groups do exist in Greece, such as
LAOS (Popular Orthodox Alarm) and Proti Grammi (Front Line). LAOS was not
able to get any MPs elected in 2004’s national election, but did get one MEP in
with 4.15% of the vote in the 2004 European Parliamentary elections. In the
previous national election, Proti Grammi received a sizable 12,000 votes and
48,000 votes in the 1999 European Parliamentary elections.
According to RAXEN, migrants and other vulnerable minorities experience
discrimination and racism at a number of levels in Greece. Albanians are
particularly vulnerable to racist discrimination and violence, and are commonly
stereotyped as criminals. A number of violent racist attacks took place against
Albanians in 2004 after the Albanian national football team defeated Greece on
home territory (as reported in RAXEN 5).
There is a severe lack of data from both official and unofficial sources that is able
to elaborate on minorities’ specific experiences of racist violence. As a result, the
Greek NFP has had to rely on media reports to identify incidents of racist violence.
7.2. MAJOR DATA COLLECTION MECHANISMS ON
RACIST VIOLENCE
See 2.2 for outline of national legislation.
According to RAXEN 3 and 4, the absence of relevant data on racist violence in
Greece is due to the following: absence of public monitoring mechanisms and
specialised bodies to undertake this task; technical deficiencies in the recording of
data where it exists; inadequate coordination of data collection between the
competent authorities; lack of interest in collecting data by the competent
authorities; lack of funding for scientific research.
7.2.1. Official data
The following sources can, in theory, supply information with respect to nationality
and discrimination, which might include instances of racist violence.
However, data on ethnicity or religion is disallowed in official record keeping.
There is no source that specifically includes data on incidents/victims of racist
violence.
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