A/HRC/28/47
87.
With regard to anti-Semitism, the United Kingdom continues to be a strong
supporter of work in international organizations to combat anti-Semitism. It plays a leading
role in the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) activities in
relation to the Berlin Declaration to combat hate crime, including anti-Semitic hate crime,
and was represented at ministerial level at the OSCE conference in November 2014
marking the tenth anniversary of the Declaration.
88.
With the London Jewish Cultural Centre, the United Kingdom organized two
seminars for journalists on how to report sensitively on difficult issues without fuelling
anti-Semitism.
89.
The United Kingdom is the Chair of the International Holocaust Remembrance
Alliance, which is working on a new multi-year work programme for all member States to
improve the ways in which they teach, research and commemorate the Holocaust. The new
work programme gives priority to the study of the killing sites across Europe, renewed
efforts to open up closed public and private archives, wider dissemination of good practice
in Holocaust teaching in schools and the raising of the profile of Holocaust remembrance
days.
United States of America
90.
The Constitutional prohibition on the establishment of a religion by the Government,
along with protections for freedoms of speech and association, as well as further protection
of those freedoms for all individuals, have contributed to combating intolerance and
discrimination against persons on the basis of religion or belief. The United States of
America stated that robust protections on freedoms of expression, religion, association and
assembly formed the basis for pluralism in the United States and for the ability of members
of all religious communities and non-religious communities to participate fully in society
and to contribute openly on an equal footing. (See www.justice.gov/crt/spec_topics/
religiousdiscrimination/).
91.
At the Department of Justice, the Special Counsel for Religious Discrimination
coordinated legal cases involving religion-based discrimination among the various sections
of the Civil Rights Division and oversaw outreach efforts to religious communities. The
Division has actively enforced the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act of
2000, which protects houses of worship from discriminatory or unjustifiably burdensome
zoning regulation. The efforts of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and the
Civil Rights Division have also included outreach to affected communities, Commission
guidance, fact sheets, question and answer documents for employers, and enforcement
efforts by both agencies.
92.
The Community Relations Service at the Department of Justice works on
engagement with members of diverse communities, encouraging the creation of
collaborative networks and creating mechanisms to work with different communities with
regard to potential areas of conflict. The Service has created a set of “best practices” to
address hate crimes and has worked directly with hundreds of rural, suburban and urban
governments to help eliminate racial distrust and polarization and provide assistance to
bring together law enforcement agencies and members of minority neighbourhoods. It also
created a law enforcement roll-call video entitled The First Three to Five Seconds, which
helps police officers reduce tension by differentiating between threats and cultural norms in
non-crisis situations.
93.
The Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties at the Department of Homeland
Security also conducts public outreach and engagement initiatives with groups, including
American Arab, Muslim, Sikh, Somali, South Asian and Middle Eastern communities, such
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