Top > World > 2007 > April > 2007-04-27

European Union Reaches Agreement on Hate Crime

After six intense years of debate, negotiation and compromise, the European Union has finally reached an agreement in an effort to fight against the growing number of hate crimes and anti-Semitic on the continent in the past few years. Despite the agreement however, anti-racist groups have attacked the draft, saying that it will not be very effective in fighting growing xenophobia in Europe.

The EU agreement called for its 27 nation states to adopt policies into their legislation, including the jail terms of up to three years for Holocaust-deniers, a trend that is unfortunately growing in the world. The European Union has "a moral authority to reaffirm ... values of tolerance, of refusal of any kind of violence, said the organization?s Justice and Home Affairs Commissioner, Mr. Franco Frattini. For six years, EU members argued about what constitutes a Holocaust, with the Baltic States demanding that massacres committed by Stalin should also be counted. However, the EU rejected this call and the final draft stipulates that a Holocaust refers to Rwanda and the Nazi mass killings of 6 million Jews. The Baltic States have been reassured that a public debate will be held to discuss other massacres and hate crimes in their region.

Not everybody is satisfied with the wording of the agreement. Many anti-racist groups feel that the draft contains too many choices for European governments, including the choice to ?opt out? of punishing violators for condoning or trivializing Holocausts if the country does not carry such laws in its own legislation. This choice may be taken by countries such as Denmark and the United Kingdom, which feel that punishing racist remarks could compromise their freedom-of-speech laws.