In Warsaw on 21 October, representatives from key international organisations held the first European conference where anti-Gypsyism was the main issue. A woman tries hard to wash a child with brown eyes and dark skin. Then, somebody hands her a pack of ARIEL washing powder. After another attempt, the child appears white and with blue
Theme: Violence and harassment
Launch of European Civil Liberties Network
An online network of groups concerned with civil liberties, democracy and equality has been launched to counter unprecedented attacks on freedoms in Europe. The European Civil Liberties Network (ECLN) brings together groups and individuals who seek to create a European society based on freedom and equality, personal and political freedom, freedom of information and equality
It’s anti-racism that was failed, not multiculturalism that failed
No country in Europe could be more proud of its multicultural experiment than Britain. But, in the wake of 7 July, or rather because Blair refuses to accept that the war in Iraq could have played a part in breeding home-grown suicide bombers, multiculturalism has become the whipping boy. And the more he divaricates from
Immigration, integration and the politics of fear
The EU needs migrant labour, particularly skilled labour, and this is reflected at a member state level in the increasingly public debate over ‘managed migration’. Politicians of all political persuasions are advocating that legal routes for migrants be opened up for the highly-skilled. The same politicians, however, promise the electorate a package of reform to
‘Speech crime’ and deportation
Throughout Europe, immigration reforms are being introduced which build in to citizenship and residence rights measures which constrain freedom of speech. If those constraining measures are breached, the punishment could be deportation. There can be no reasonable objection to the deportation of a foreign national who incites violence and hatred, if a court rules that
ID cards: implications for Black, Minority Ethnic, migrant and refugee communities
The Identity Cards Bill, introduced on 25 May 2005, is aimed at enabling the policing of a harder boundary of entitlement between British citizens and foreigners. The result will be the creation of a new under-class of those who are ‘sans plastique’. The government’s ID cards programme is being justified by the perceived need to
Election deportation targets put lives at risk
In the run-up to the election, the Conservative Party is proposing to remove all asylum seekers who exceed an annual quota of 20,000, whether or not their claims are valid. The Labour government has already set a target to deport more people each month than make new claims for asylum that go on to be
The deportation machine: unmonitored and unimpeded
We publish below the introduction to The deportation machine: Europe, asylum and human rights. We live in an age in which the rich industrialised world pronounces on human rights abuses abroad while failing to live up to its own standards at home, particularly in relation to its obligations under international law. But whereas the erosion
Turkish-speaking communities in Britain: a rude awakening
A new report from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation examines some of the major issues affecting young people from one of Britain’s long established, yet little heeded, ‘invisible’ minorities. Here, a community worker reflects on some of those issues and the need to air them in a wider debate. ‘I’d rather be a P*ki than a
New Danish government will link development aid to asylum
Next week, the Danish parliament will reconvene and prime minister Rasmussen will announce the composition of Denmark’s next coalition government. But whatever shape the new government takes, the results of the February general election has implications for refugees, not only in Denmark but across the EU. Since 2001, Denmark has been governed by a coalition