Prometheus 6

By the time this is ratified by all EU members racism will have already been eliminated. In fact, that strikes me as a prerequisite for passage.

"The proposed list risks opening the floodgates on a plethora of historical controversies -- like the crimes of the Stalinist regime or the alleged Armenian genocide -- whose inclusion could pose a grave threat to freedom of speech," Watson said. "The E.U. has no business legislating on history."

E.U. officials said the new regulations include protections for films, theater, art and historical research.

E.U. Ministers Agree on Rules Against Hate Crimes, Racism
By Molly Moore
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, April 20, 2007; A25

PARIS, April 19 -- European Union officials agreed Thursday to new regulations for combating hate crimes and racism at a time when xenophobia and concern over immigration have been increasing across the 27-country bloc.

"It is an important political signal for the E.U.," said German Justice Minister Brigitte Zypries, who with justice and interior ministers from throughout the European Union reached agreement in Luxembourg after a six-year effort.

The proposed regulations are subject to the approval of national parliaments, and they allow individual countries latitude in defining some crimes and penalizing offenders. Even so, E.U. officials said Thursday's agreement represented a major milestone in persuading all member countries to fight incitement to hatred or violence based on skin color, race or national or ethnic origin.

"There are no safe havens in Europe for racist violence, for anti-Semitism, for people concretely inciting xenophobic hatred," said the E.U. justice commissioner, Franco Frattini.

The documents urge E.U. nations to impose prison sentences of up to three years for individuals convicted of denying genocide, such as the mass killing of Jews during World War II or the massacres in Rwanda in 1994.The rules would require countries to prosecute offenders in connection with killings that have been recognized as genocides by the International Criminal Court in The Hague.