RACIST VIOLENCE IN 15 EU MEMBER STATES - Cospe

More documents

Recommendations

Info

RACIST VIOLENCE IN 15 EU MEMBER STATES - A Comparative Overview of Findings from the RAXEN NFP Reports 2001-2004 violent acts. The Ombudsman stressed that certain national groups feel unable to report to the police because of fear of ill-treatment from them; these feelings are particularly acute in cases involving allegations of police violence. However, abuse by agents of the State continues to be reported. Notably, in September 2004, some army commandos violently abused a group of illegal immigrants on a remote island and videoed their abuse. Encouragingly, once these abuses came to light, the Ministry of the Defence took swift action – though an incentive for this could have been the international media outcry in the aftermath of revelations about US soldiers’ abuses of inmates at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. In light of the media attention on Athens in the period of the Olympic games, some effort was made to encourage the police to effectively deal with other nationalities. A handbook was issued to police officers, containing national and international references to human and civil rights, and instructions on how to deal with non- Greek speakers. At the level of local government, a number of initiatives have been established that also address different aspects of discrimination and racism, including racist violence. For example, under the terms of law 2910/2001, local councils for the prevention of crime have been recently established in ten municipalities with the remit to, amongst other things, combat racism and violence. And in 2002, in view of municipal elections, the ‘Citizens’ Movement Against Racism’ drew up an ‘Anti-Racist Charter for Local Authorities’, which many left of centre candidates included in their election programmes and campaigns. At the same time as mechanisms do not exist to effectively monitor racist violence, existing legislation is woefully inadequate in punishing racist offenders; for example: Law 927/1979, which is now 25 years old, is the only specifically anti-racist criminal law in Greece, which states that: ‘whoever intentionally and publicly instigates, either orally or in the press or through written texts or illustrations or through any other means, acts or activities capable of provoking discrimination, hatred or violence against persons or a group of persons, only due to their racial or national origin, is punishable by imprisonment of up to two years or a fine or both’. The law has been amended to include participation in organised racist groups and discrimination on the grounds of religion. However, to date, there has only been one attempt to enforce this law. A range of legal provisions are in place, including mechanisms for monitoring the authorities – such as the Greek Ombudsman (Law 2477/1997), which, theoretically, should be able to address a range of discriminatory and racist treatment. However, as illustrated by the ineffectiveness of Law 927/1979 (above), there is the ‘law in the books’ and the ‘law in practice’. In sum, Greek legislation against racist violence and mechanisms for monitoring incidents of racist violence, and criminal justice responses to them, are ineffectual 88
RACIST VIOLENCE IN 15 EU MEMBER STATES - A Comparative Overview of Findings from the RAXEN NFP Reports 2001-2004 or non-existent. Without effective legislation and monitoring mechanisms there is no means, other than through newspaper reports, to obtain primary data on the nature and extent of racist violence in Greece. However, as reported in RAXEN 4, the range of new anti-discrimination initiatives in the public and private sector - from employment through to housing - indicates that Greece is open to combat discrimination and racism in a range of settings. 8. Spain 8.1. CONTEXT Like its Portuguese neighbour, Spain has recently emerged as a country of immigration. Since the early 1990s, numbers of both legal and illegal immigrants have significantly increased. To a large extent, the country’s immigration patterns reflect its colonial history in Latin America and its geographical proximity to and historical links with North Africa. Spain’s burgeoning economy, in the aftermath of dictatorship, has also proved an attractive pull for migrants from central and east European countries. According to RAXEN 4, which refers to Spain’s Foreign Status Statistics Yearbook 2002, there are 1,448,671 foreigners officially registered as living in Spain – this represents 3.2% of the population. Breaking down registered foreign residents according to their country of origin, the majority are European (35.5%), followed by people from the American continent (28.7%), Africans (27.7%), and Asians (7.9%). However, given the large numbers of unregistered immigrants in Spain, these official figures are open to question, and the actual figure of registered and unregistered immigrants is likely to be far higher. 76 Both RAXEN 3 and 4 suggest that Spanish society is becoming increasingly less tolerant of immigrants. 77 They also suggest that there are indications of increased racist violence against foreigners – a large proportion of which, according to media reports, is perpetrated by extreme right-wing groups. However, the extent and nature of racist violence in Spain is not clarified in RAXEN 3 and 4 due to the absence of both official and unofficial data sources on this subject. 76 77 The Eurostat non-national population figures for Spain, given in Annex I, are higher. Cea d’Ancona, M. A. (2004), La activación de la xenofobia en España ¿Qué miden las encuestas?, Madrid, Centro de Investigaciones Sociológicas – report by the Centre for Sociological Research indicates that the percentage of Spaniards showing aversion to foreigners, according to their research, increased from 8 per cent in 1996 to 32 per cent in 2004. 89
Page 1 and 2:
RACIST VIOLENCE IN 15 EU MEMBER STA
Page 3 and 4:
Page 5 and 6:
Page 7 and 8:
Page 9 and 10:
Page 11 and 12:
Page 13 and 14:
Page 15 and 16:
Page 17 and 18:
Page 19 and 20:
Page 21 and 22:
Page 23 and 24:
Page 25 and 26:
Page 27 and 28:
Page 29 and 30:
Page 31 and 32:
Page 33 and 34:
Page 35 and 36:
Page 37 and 38:
Page 39 and 40: RACIST VIOLENCE IN 15 EU MEMBER STA
Page 89: RACIST VIOLENCE IN 15 EU MEMBER STA
Page 141 and 142:
Page 143 and 144:
Page 145 and 146:
Page 147 and 148:
Page 149 and 150:
Page 151 and 152:
Page 153 and 154:
Page 155 and 156:
Page 157 and 158:
Page 159 and 160:
Page 161 and 162:
Page 163 and 164:
Page 165 and 166:
Page 167 and 168:
Page 169 and 170:
Page 171 and 172:
Page 173 and 174:
Page 175 and 176:
Official data on racist crime/discr
Page 177 and 178:
Table continued Source of data Data
Page 179 and 180:
Table continued Source of data Data
Page 181 and 182:
UK continued Source of data Data fo
Page 183 and 184:
Page 185 and 186:
Page 187 and 188:
Page 189 and 190:
Page 191 and 192:
Page 193 and 194:
Page 195 and 196:
Page 197 and 198:
Page 199 and 200:
Page 201 and 202:
Page 203 and 204:
Page 205 and 206:
Page 207 and 208:
Page 209 and 210:
Page 211 and 212:
Page 213 and 214:
Page 215:
show all

RACIST VIOLENCE IN 15 EU MEMBER STATES - Cospe

Create successful ePaper yourself

Delete template?

Save as template?