ECRI 10th Anniversary Conference in Strasburg

ECRI 10th Anniversary Conference in Strasburg

On March 18, 2004 ECRI 10th anniversary conference was organized in Strasburg. Representatives of several different countries attended the conference. The executive director of the Human Rights Information and Documentation Center (HRIDC)  was invited to the conference as the only representative from Georgia. The ever-changing nature of racism and the challenges that it poses to European societies was discussed at the 10th anniversary conference of the European Commission against Racism and Intolerance (ECRI) at the Council of Europe on Thursday March 18.

ECRI, the independent anti-racism watchdog of the Council of Europe, began combating racism, xenophobia, anti-Semitism, and intolerance in 1994. A decade later, the conference reviewed and assessed ECRI’s action and evaluated the impact of its work.

Other issues discussed at the conference included: (1) Combating racism while fighting terrorism; (2) Combating racism in the context of migration in Europe; and (3) Racism: a mutating bacillus Islamophobia, anti-Semitism and cultural racism as new challenges in our societies.

Rita Verdonk, Minister for Immigration and Integration of the Netherlands, Walter Schwimmer, the Organisation’s Secretary General, Peter Schieder, President of the Council of Europe’s Parliamentary Assembly, and Alvaro Gil-Robles, its Commissioner for Human Rights, addressed the opening session of the conference.

Other speakers included Zygmunt Bauman, Emeritus Professor at the University of Leeds, Dimitrina Petrova, Director of the European Roma Rights Centre and Aaron Rhodes, Executive Director of the International Helsinki Federation. Catherine LalumiХre, Vice-President of the European Parliament, also presented her views on the challenges which ECRI will have to face
in the future.

The conference was open to the press.

For further information please see www.coe.int/ECRI-2004