Back in early December, Rafal Gorski, returned to Poland planning never again to return to Scotland. This is because of all of the racist insults and harassment that he had to put up with. He said while simply walking down the street people would yell out, “F***ing Polish, go back to Poland!”
Of course, the taunts are not enough to make everyone leave. However, if the taunts did not scare people, the threats on their lives and the lives of their families do. Many of the Polish people leaving the area said that they simply could not take day-to-day life in Scotland anymore. This has now put Scotland on the map, but for all the wrong reasons.
The real name of Mr Gorskis was changed by the media in order to protect him. Apparently reports showed that he was allegedly abused. Reports suggest that his neighbor, whose name is not being released, took part in the abuse of the Polish family.
One Polish family, who was interviewed after being attacked, said that the couple that attacked them said that they were stealing jobs from the locals. They said that Polish people had no right to be in Scotland, and they should go back to Poland.
Also, two months ago, police in Scotland found graffiti on a bridge that said, “Polish C**ts, Get out of Scotland.” Police statistics show reports of hate crimes against other white people have risen fivefold in Scotland over recent years. Experts say that the hate crimes on Polish people are the main cause of this. A 2008 study found that there was an increase in racial tension in the Highlands. Eastern Europeans were among the most frequently targeted.
Emigrate.co.uk
Tuesday, 28 December 2010
GERMAN POLICE UNION URGES BAN OF FAR-RIGHT NPD
Germany's police union GdP and the Central Council of Jews in Germany have appealed for renewed efforts to ban the National Democratic Party (NPD), a fringe group with no federal-level representation, but with seats in two of Germany's 16 state parliaments. "From my own and a police point of view, I urge and support a ban," police union head Bernhard Witthaut told Deutsche Welle. "I think it's terrible how they mock foreigners living in Germany, I think their concept of a state is terrible." Witthaut was not alone in his comments. The president of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, Dieter Graumann, said in an interview over the weekend that the NPD, which currently has an estimated 7,000 members, had clearly set itself the goal of destroying democracy in Germany. The country must resist such attempts, he said, if necessary by issuing a ban. The head of the Turkish Community in Germany, Kenan Kolat, urged a more consistent prosecution of xenophobic attacks in Germany. Banning the NPD, he told the news agency dapd, could also "have a positive effect in the fight against right-wing extremism and racism." The German government attempted to ban the NPD in a case heard by the country's highest court, the Constitutional Court, in 2001. But the case was thrown out two years later after it was disclosed that several people in the NPD's inner circle were German secret service undercover agents or informants.
Signal in the fight against far-right extremism
The police union's Witthaut said that some people in law enforcement believed it would be easier to deal with the far-right party if you knew how it operated and where it was active, whereas if the party were to go underground, it would be much more difficult to keep an eye on its activities. But he said he was convinced that outlawing a party listed as racist, anti-Semitic and revisionist by Germany's domestic intelligence agency would be "an important signal in the fight against right-wing extremism." "Many might view the risk of a renewed failure before Germany's highest court as such a grave aspect that they might dismiss steps in that direction," Bavaria's Interior Minister Joachim Herrmann said on Monday. But he added that banning the NPD was desirable, and he would continue to lobby for a ban of the party.
The Deutsche Welle
Turkey needs hate crime laws, civil society groups say
Turkey needs to legally define a category for offenses and crimes that were perpetrated solely due to hatred of an individual or minority group, according to a number of civil society organizations and jurists.
Turkey, not unlike most countries of the world, is not free of crime against minorities and disadvantaged groups. Among these, crimes motivated by bias against the target due to their background or identity are defined as hate crimes. However, the Turkish Penal Code (TCK) does not include such a category. The Social Change Association, in a bid to lobby for creating such a legal category, recently held a rally against hate crimes.
Hate crimes were first included in international criminal law in 2003. Forty-eight Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) members now have legislation that categorizes hate crimes, while eight OSCE members, including Turkey, currently have no such legal description of bias-motivated crimes in their penal codes. “A symbolic message would be given if this is put into law,” says OSCE representative Tankut Soykan, adding, “This will show that such crimes are not tolerated and that they cannot be covered up.”
The Social Change Association and the Initiative to Stop Nationalism have jointly started a campaign under which a number of activities and events will be held in addition to preparing a bill in this direction. A group of jurists are working on the proposed legislation, while the two organizations will also collect signatures for their cause. The campaign started with a two-day symposium organized at the Taksim Hill Hotel on Dec. 17-18.
Hate crime law will send a message
Soykan, the adviser on Combating Intolerance and Discrimination against Muslims at OSCE, has stated that legal measures alone are not enough to combat hate crimes, stressing that social policy changes are also necessary. He said integrating this definition into legislation would serve more symbolically to highlight that such crimes would never be covered up.
“If you do this, you answer forcefully such crimes as the political mechanism, which would in turn contribute to social awareness on the issue. Such a law would also work to make security forces more active in this regard, and victims will be more aware of how to seek legal remedies,” he said, adding that in other countries special laws made hate crimes punishable more severely in comparison to the same offenses not motivated by bias against the target.
“But you still need more than laws. For example, if you look at Kosovo, it has the world's best anti-hate crime legislation, but you don't see any of that when you look at practice. Creating awareness amongst the public is very important. Increasing people's sensitivity on this issue would be much more effective than amending the law,” he said.
Asuman İnceoğlu, an assistant professor at Bilgi University, says such crimes should be punished with the harshest penalties possible within the confines of criminal law. She stressed that there was no way a judge could hand down a harsher punishment for a crime committed due to bias if this is not defined legally.
“If the perpetrators are not punished, this gives them the message that they can get away with it, which in turn brings about a cycle of crime. This is why harsher sanctions are needed in criminal law for crimes of this type,” she said.
TodayZaman
Turkey, not unlike most countries of the world, is not free of crime against minorities and disadvantaged groups. Among these, crimes motivated by bias against the target due to their background or identity are defined as hate crimes. However, the Turkish Penal Code (TCK) does not include such a category. The Social Change Association, in a bid to lobby for creating such a legal category, recently held a rally against hate crimes.
Hate crimes were first included in international criminal law in 2003. Forty-eight Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) members now have legislation that categorizes hate crimes, while eight OSCE members, including Turkey, currently have no such legal description of bias-motivated crimes in their penal codes. “A symbolic message would be given if this is put into law,” says OSCE representative Tankut Soykan, adding, “This will show that such crimes are not tolerated and that they cannot be covered up.”
The Social Change Association and the Initiative to Stop Nationalism have jointly started a campaign under which a number of activities and events will be held in addition to preparing a bill in this direction. A group of jurists are working on the proposed legislation, while the two organizations will also collect signatures for their cause. The campaign started with a two-day symposium organized at the Taksim Hill Hotel on Dec. 17-18.
Hate crime law will send a message
Soykan, the adviser on Combating Intolerance and Discrimination against Muslims at OSCE, has stated that legal measures alone are not enough to combat hate crimes, stressing that social policy changes are also necessary. He said integrating this definition into legislation would serve more symbolically to highlight that such crimes would never be covered up.
“If you do this, you answer forcefully such crimes as the political mechanism, which would in turn contribute to social awareness on the issue. Such a law would also work to make security forces more active in this regard, and victims will be more aware of how to seek legal remedies,” he said, adding that in other countries special laws made hate crimes punishable more severely in comparison to the same offenses not motivated by bias against the target.
“But you still need more than laws. For example, if you look at Kosovo, it has the world's best anti-hate crime legislation, but you don't see any of that when you look at practice. Creating awareness amongst the public is very important. Increasing people's sensitivity on this issue would be much more effective than amending the law,” he said.
Asuman İnceoğlu, an assistant professor at Bilgi University, says such crimes should be punished with the harshest penalties possible within the confines of criminal law. She stressed that there was no way a judge could hand down a harsher punishment for a crime committed due to bias if this is not defined legally.
“If the perpetrators are not punished, this gives them the message that they can get away with it, which in turn brings about a cycle of crime. This is why harsher sanctions are needed in criminal law for crimes of this type,” she said.
TodayZaman
Race row comic Frankie Boyle loses a third of his TV audience (UK)
Frankie Boyle has lost a third of his TV audience as he faces a storm over his use of racist language.
The Scots comic launched his controversial Channel 4 series Tramadol Nights to a healthy 1.3 million viewers on November 30. But now he is proving a major turn-off after causing outrage with a string of tasteless gags.
In last week’s show the Sun columnist made a joke at the expense of Katie Price’s disabled son Harvey and upset many by using the words P*** and n*****. Yester-day it emerged his average audience figures were down to 880,000 by December 14.
Bosses fear even more will switch off when the last episode of the six-part series is screened tomorrow. Channel 4 were yesterday unavailable to confirm the figures for his most recent broadcast.
During the show Boyle referred to a bomb wiping out “a whole bunch of P****” and joked about the “Ministry of War” having a “department of n***** bombing”.
Despite a flood of complaints Channel 4 bosses have consistently defended the near-the-knuckle comedian. Chief executive David Abraham insisted last week: “Comedy is very subjective and the intent of these sketches is manifestly satirical.”
But critics were furious. A spokesman for Show Racism the Red Card said: “We condemn the use of racist terminology. It is never acceptable in any context.”
The Scots comic launched his controversial Channel 4 series Tramadol Nights to a healthy 1.3 million viewers on November 30. But now he is proving a major turn-off after causing outrage with a string of tasteless gags.
In last week’s show the Sun columnist made a joke at the expense of Katie Price’s disabled son Harvey and upset many by using the words P*** and n*****. Yester-day it emerged his average audience figures were down to 880,000 by December 14.
Bosses fear even more will switch off when the last episode of the six-part series is screened tomorrow. Channel 4 were yesterday unavailable to confirm the figures for his most recent broadcast.
During the show Boyle referred to a bomb wiping out “a whole bunch of P****” and joked about the “Ministry of War” having a “department of n***** bombing”.
Despite a flood of complaints Channel 4 bosses have consistently defended the near-the-knuckle comedian. Chief executive David Abraham insisted last week: “Comedy is very subjective and the intent of these sketches is manifestly satirical.”
But critics were furious. A spokesman for Show Racism the Red Card said: “We condemn the use of racist terminology. It is never acceptable in any context.”
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