National focal points discuss improving state responses to hate crimes at OSCE meeting in Helsinki

HELSINKI, 16 June 2008 - Ways of improving state responses in the fight against crimes motivated by racism, xenophobia, anti-Semitism and other forms of intolerance, including against Muslims and Christians, will be discussed at a meeting in Helsinki today.

The two-day event will bring together government focal points on hate crimes from 38 OSCE participating States. The meeting was organized by the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) and the Finnish OSCE Chairmanship.

"Governments face numerous challenges in the fight against hate-motivated violence. Organized hate groups increasingly use the Internet to spread their ideology of hate and to incite violent crimes against particular communities," said Ambassador Christian Strohal, the Director of ODIHR.

"The transborder nature of hate crimes requires dialogue and co-operation among States at the regional level."

In response to an alarming number of hate crimes, OSCE participating States tasked the ODIHR to compile and disseminate information and good practices, and assist national authorities in stepping up their efforts to fight hate-motivated violence.

Focal points have been appointed in governments throughout the region to provide the ODIHR with national data and information on efforts of governmental authorities to strengthen their response to hate-motivated incidents.

"Hate-motivated violence has a much more powerful and lasting psychological impact than other crimes. These crimes target entire communities and threaten our identity, our beliefs and our lives," said Strohal.

"Some of these cases are prosecuted and perpetrators arrested, but unfortunately we often learn that attackers were not identified or that the crime cannot be prosecuted."

Strohal said that the work of focal points in developing more effective responses to hate crime is an important step towards making societies more secure and stable.

The national focal points will discuss good practices in data collection and hate crime legislation in various OSCE participating States, as well as the ODIHR's educational, police training and legislative support programmes that are available to assist OSCE States in their efforts to combat hate crimes.

The meeting will also be attended by the three Personal Representatives of the OSCE Chairman-in-Office on the promotion of tolerance.