Civil society and government authorities must work together to accurately record hate crime in Europe, say conference participants

Co-operation among police and civil society in monitoring and recording hate crimes was the focus of the conference “Facing Facts Forward”, organized by CEJI – A Jewish Contribution to an Inclusive Europe, in collaboration with the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR), the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) and the European Commission against Racism and Intolerance (ECRI), in Brussels on 3 and 4 March 2015.

During the conference, which brought together more than 100 representatives from civil society, governments and international organizations, participants discussed ways to support collaboration between civil society and authorities to further develop the reporting mechanisms related to hate crimes.

"Civil society organizations working with victims of hate crime can help public authorities improve their ability to recognize these crimes and encourage victims to report them, but effort needs to be made to build trusting relationships between communities and local authorities" ODIHR Hate Crime Officer Joanna Perry told the conference.

ODIHR's 2013 data continued to reveal significant gaps in official information on hate crimes, illustrating the ongoing challenges to implementing OSCE commitments on hate crime recording in participating States. ODIHR's information also included incidents reported by 109 civil society organizations and groups, covering 45 countries.

"Many victims don't report hate crimes because they don't know that what has happened to them can be reported," said Robin Sclafani, Director of CEJI. "This is why we launched our Do you know what a hate crime is? video, to give a crystal clear message about what hate crimes are and that they should be reported."