Roundtable Discussion: Hate Speech and Hate Crime Targeting Religious and Ethnic Communities

​Europe has seen an increase of hate speech and hate crime on the basis of religion and ethnicity during the last year. Hateful rhetorics as well as fear are spreading especially rapidly with the help of right-wing extremist propaganda. Consequences of hate speech and hate crime include dangerous limitations of human rights and further divisions within society.

​Come join us at our roundtable at the European Parliament to gain insights on this pressing issue! The objectives of the event are to discuss hate speech and hate crime from different perspectives and to find actionable solutions to the problem. For this, we are honored to welcome a panel of four speakers that have done work on the topic, including policy makers, experts and representatives of civil society.

​Speakers:

​Evin Incir is a Swedish member of the European Parliament from the Socialists & Democrats group. She will discuss the role the Parliament plays in combating hate speech and hate crime.

​Günter Bressau, hate speech specialist, will present the work of two online portals to report hate speech, namely REspect! and Report_Hate.

​Lilia Bensedrine-Thabet will focus on the prevention of hate speech and hate crime, for example by talking about her Co-chair committee for Interreligious & Interconvictional Dialogue of the CINGO.

​Wolfram Bechtel will be joining us to discuss different forms of hate speech and hate crime as well as the work of the Council of Europe Steering Committee on Anti-discrimination, Diversity and Inclusion.