Press release
MEPs urge adoption of a legal framework to combat racism and xenophobia
Justice and home affairs - 21-06-2007 - 13:38
Plenary sessions
Plenary sessions
The European Parliament adopted a report on taking effective action racism and xenophobia in all Member States. MEPs say that minimum harmonisation at European level is needed to defend one of EU's most important common values. MEPs evaluate the progress of negotiations conducted at Council on this framework decision and expect to be formally re-consulted by Council in the coming months on the basis of the political agreement reached by Ministers of Justice last 19 April.
The aim of the draft decision as it stands now is to ensure that all Member States will impose harmonised criminal sanctions -from one to three years of prison- to any public incitement to violence and hatred against persons of a different race, colour, religion, national or ethnic descendent, dissemination of writings with such content, public approval, denial or gross trivialisation of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes.
The draft legislation does not forbid specific symbols per se --such as swastikas-- and does not mention specific historic events, but it appeals to the definitions of war crimes or genocide contained in the Statute of the International Criminal Court and the Nuremberg Tribunal of 1945.
Parliament's report aims to send a strong political message on the need to ratify this framework decision as soon as possible and recommends Council to "recognise" in the final text the fact that "some Member States have criminalised the denial or flagrant trivialisation of genocide" like the holocaust.
Criminal sanctions should be more severe in the case of public figures and representatives of the authorities, as their status should constitute an aggravating circumstance, MEPs stressed in the text. Other recommendations by Parliament are focussed on fixing common definitions on terms such as "racist and xenophobic offences" or "public order offence".
The Chamber finally requested EU governments to issue an evaluation report on this framework decision at the latest 3 years after it enters into force.
The fact that this legislation will be a framework decision implies that the general provisions adopted by the EU will have to be transposed into different national laws afterwards, allowing Member States the necessary degree of flexibility to maintain their specific constitutional traditions regarding the right to freedom of expression.
REF.: 20070615IPR07918