Amnesty bashes Germany for inaction on racism
Amnesty International has urged Germany to stop inaction against racism, as attacks on migrants and refugees are being reported across the European country.
An official with the Amnesty International said Saturday that clear policies for combating racism need to be devised in Germany, a country where she said discrimination against minorities and ethnic groups is high.
“Discriminatory police checks are still the order of the day and must be abolished,” General Secretary of Amnesty’s German section Selmin Caliskan said, urging Germans to view racism as a problem for the whole society.
Caliskan’s remarks come as a conference on hate crimes and racism is due to inaugurate in the German city of Dresden later in the day, with more than 500 members of Amnesty and rights advocates in attendance.
The meeting, which will not be open to the public, is expected to highlight a wave of anti-Muslim gatherings and demonstrations last year, which was led by extremist group PEGIDA. The group originally initiated in the same east German city and managed to organize events across the country and some other European states. However, it finally saw its base of support hugely diminished in the wake of calls by government officials on people to ignore the group’s hate campaign.
Caliskan further said the rise of such groups as PEGIDA in Germany was in fact the result of racism not its cause.
“For me, PEGIDA is not the cause but rather the consequence of a societal problem, namely racism,” she said, adding that the government in Berlin should intensify its efforts in dealing with the issue mainly through launching education programs for police and government officials.
Documenting abuses
Representatives from Amnesty’s main headquarters in London continue documenting the cases of rights abuses and discrimination by police and government officials in Germany, Caliskan said, adding however, that the findings of the report on the issue would not be published until 2016.
Caliskan said people tend to keep silent on cases of police abusing their rights – perhaps out of fear – making the documentation more difficult.
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