Niall Crowley Chief Executive of the Equality Authority expressed his organisation’s support for a Declaration for a shared committment to combat racism adopted by member states of the Council of Europe, including Ireland, in Strasbourg yesterday. In response to the Political Declaration which was made at a European Conference Against Racism Niall Crowley said:
“The Ministers of the Council of Europe member states, including Minister John O’Donoghue today adopted an important and valuable Political Declaration at the concluding session of the European Conference Against Racism. This is the preparatory conference for next years UN Global Conference on racism.
The Equality Authority participated at the conference and has welcomed the political declaration for the shared commitment to the fight against racism that it expresses and for the priority that is now to be accorded to addressing racism.
The political declaration poses challenges to Ireland. We must now organise to give practical expression to its commitments. In particular we:
- need to develop a participative process to prepare and implement a national action plan to combat racism.
- need to take specific actions to promote and protect the cultural identity of minorities.
- need to ensure adequate training and awareness raising for public officials. In this way the combat against racism can develop as an objective of all policy and practice.”
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