Parties sign pact to shun racism in Euro-polls

Date: 18/02/1999

By Gareth Harding

MORE than 50 political parties from all but two EU member states have signed a key European charter designed to combat racism in political life, one year after it was drawn up.

The code of conduct commits political groups to avoid stirring up hostility between racial groups, to deal firmly with racist behaviour within their own ranks, to refuse to work with political parties which incite racial hatred and to increase the number of candidates from ethnic minorities standing for election.

The signatories include most parties in Belgium, Finland, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and Spain, plus French and Portuguese Socialists, Danish Social Democrats and the Greens in Germany and Austria.

However, certain political groups are absent from the list. No parties in Italy or Sweden have signed, nor have any of their larger counterparts in Germany and the UK.

Given the pledge not to forge alliances with racist groups, the list will also raise a few eyebrows in the Strasbourg-based assembly, where some strange relationships have been struck between political parties.

After the last elections the Christian Democrats, who have signed the charter, invited the Italian Forza Europa party to join the Parliament's second largest group. As former Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi's party shared power with the neo-fascist Alleanza Nazionale at the time, the Christian Democrats were sharply criticised by other parties.

On the charter's first anniversary, the head of the EU Monitoring Centre for Racism and Xenophobia, Beate Winckler, called on political parties to abide by the code during June's Euro-elections.