RIGHTS-EUROPE: Muslims are Less Equal

By Sanjay Suri Reprint | | Print |

Sanjay Suri

LONDON, Nov 11 2002 (IPS) - Leading member states of the European Union are disregarding their own directives over giving equal rights to Muslims, says a major study.

The report on ‘Minority Protection in the European Union’ says the EU "has not matched the strength of its rhetorical commitment to democratic values and inclusiveness with a comprehensive clarification of the content of those values in policy and practice."

The report has been produced by the European Union Accession Monitoring Programme (EUMAP) of the Britain-based Open Society Institute. EUMAP has been monitoring human rights and the rule of law in 10 Central-Eastern European and the five largest EU countries.

Not all EU member states have brought their legislation into compliance with EU standards in the area of non-discrimination as set forth in the Race Equality and Employment Directives, the report says. "Assessing the situation of Muslims living in Europe demonstrates that even these standards are not sufficiently comprehensive; discrimination on grounds of religious affiliation is covered only in the Employment Directive."

The report points to widespread discrimination. It says that "though the majority of Muslims living in France are French citizens, segments of the public continue to consider Maghrebi Muslims – unlike immigrants from other countries such as Italy, Spain and Portugal – to be immigrants even after four generations in France." Italians tend to "overwhelmingly associate immigration with Islam, even though Muslims do not constitute the majority of immigrants."

Neither Germany nor Spain has adopted comprehensive anti-discrimination legislation, the report says. "In both countries, efforts are under way to bring domestic legislation into compliance with the Race Directive, but little progress has been made."

Even in those States that have already adopted comprehensive anti-discrimination legislation, there are still important gaps, the report says. French anti-discrimination legislation recognises and sanctions discrimination on religious grounds, but does not offer a clear definition of indirect discrimination because doing so would imply referring to categories of the population which is prohibited by the French Constitution, the report quotes an expert as saying.

In Germany, the report says, issues related to discrimination or violence against minorities are referred to the Commission for Foreigners’ Affairs because "there is no specialised body competent to deal with discrimination and violence against minority citizens or the promotion of minority identity at the Federal level."

The report says it is often difficult to substantiate the extent of discrimination against Muslims, as little data has been collected using religion as an indicator. But it points to several areas where studies have indicated discrimination.

British and French Muslims report unfair treatment as a result of educational policies and practices that are insufficiently sensitive to their background and culture. In France there have been tensions after Muslim students have asserted their right to wear veils.

The report says there are still comparatively few immigrant children in the Italian education system, but patterns of lower than average attendance and achievement, and higher drop out rates are already emerging.

French temporary employment agencies report receiving specific requests from companies not to send Muslim workers. The report says French Muslims report discrimination in hiring and at the workplace more frequently than in any other area, though few legal complaints are filed.

The Employment Directive requires member states specifically and explicitly to prohibit direct and indirect religious discrimination in employment, the report points out. "It will thus require employers to monitor their employment decisions on the basis of religious affiliation in order to ensure that a policy, practice, provision or criterion does not have the unintended effect of disadvantaging Muslims or employees of any other faith," the report says.

A number of studies in France have revealed that discrimination is common in selecting applicants for subsidised public housing as well as in the private housing market. In both France and Italy, there have been reports of public housing officials routinely allocating public housing on the basis of discriminatory evaluations of applicants presumed to be of foreign origin, the report says. The housing which is made available of often of inferior quality.

In the French public healthcare system, including in public hospitals, the report says that documented inequalities in health outcomes between different minority groups suggest that health service providers fail to reach Muslim communities or to meet their needs. In Britain three-quarters of Muslim organisations in a Home Office study reported unfair treatment from social services staff and from practices in social services departments.

The report points to a pattern of discrimination in sentencing in France, with individuals whose ethnic origin (or supposed ethnic origin) is not French receiving longer sentences for similar crimes

The report reminds EU member states of the Copenhagen criteria established at the 1993 European Council meeting in Copenhagen in Denmark. The criteria include a directive that membership of the EU requires "respect for and protection of minorities."

Protection of minorities is a "core EU value" and should be "fully integrated into existing EU standards, and stronger mechanisms should be set in place to monitor compliance with human and minority rights standards by all EU member States," the report says.

The report points out that "the EU still has insufficient means of ensuring member States’ compliance with the human rights commitments it is in the process of defining."

It recommends that pan-European forums should be organised to develop a common baseline interpretation of the shape that national anti-discrimination legislation should take both in theory and in practice.

The EU should devote resources toward researching, in close collaboration with minority representatives, acceptable methodologies for conducting research on discrimination, the report says. It should also compile data on the situation of vulnerable minority populations.

RIGHTS-EUROPE: Muslims are Less Equal

By Sanjay Suri Reprint | | Print |

Sanjay Suri

LONDON, Nov 11 2002 (IPS) - Leading member states of the European Union are disregarding their own directives over giving equal rights to Muslims, says a major study.
(more…)