racism

The Ark of Return, the Permanent Memorial to Honour the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade, located at the Visitors' Plaza of UN Headquarters in New York.
UN Photo/Rick Bajornas

UN spotlights slave descendants’ legacy of achievements, overcoming ‘dark chapter of human history’

24 March 2017
Stressing the importance of remembering slavery and slave trade in human history, the legacy of which “resounds down the ages,” United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres today highlighted the contributions that people of African descent have made and are continuing to make to their communities and to the world.
Students watch a performance by their peers at Barros Barreto School, in Salvador, Brazil. The performance tackled social issues such as racism and gender discrimination..
UNICEF/Claudio Versiani

Ahead of International Day, UN rights chief urges governments to target hate speech, crimes

20 March 2017
Human Rights

On the eve of the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, the United Nations human rights chief today reminded Governments around the world that they have a legal obligation to stop hate speech and hate crimes, and called on people everywhere to “stand up for someone’s rights.”

Mutuma Ruteere.
UN Photo/Jean-Marc Ferré

Australian indigenous “disproportionally represented” in justice system

19 December 2016
General News

Indigenous people in Australia are “disproportionally represented” in the country’s criminal justice system according to a United Nations rights expert.

Audio -
Special Rapporteur Maina Kiai.
UN Photo/Jean-Marc Ferré

Racism in US casts ‘dark shadow’ over rights to free assembly, association – UN expert

28 July 2016
The United States is struggling to live up to its ideals in the area of racial, social and economic inequality, which is negatively affecting the exercise of the rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and of association, a United Nations human rights expert said today at the end of his first official fact-finding mission to the country.
Protestors in New York City demonstrate in the wake of the verdict in the case of the police shooting of Missouri teenager Michael Brown (24 November 2014).
Jacques Baudrier

UN condemns this week's deadly gun violence in US

8 July 2016
United Nations officials today spoke out against recent violence in the United States which has left several people dead, expressing both outrage and condemnation over the killings, and highlighting the need for more to be done to fight discrimination.
UN Special Rapporteur on Contemporary Forms of Racism, Mutuma Ruteere.
UN Photo/Jean-Marc Ferré

Brexit shows need for politicians to stamp out racism says expert

28 June 2016
General News

Politicians have a responsibility in the wake of the UK’s decision to leave the European Union not to play on people’s fears over migration, causing racist and xenophobic sentiment and hate crimes.

Audio -
Protestors in New York City demonstrate in the wake of the verdict in the case of the police shooting of Missouri teenager Michael Brown (24 November 2014).
Jacques Baudrier

UN experts urge US to address legacies of the past, police impunity and ‘crisis of racial injustice’

29 January 2016
The legacy of slavery, post-Reconstruction ‘Jim Crow’ laws and racial subordination in the United States remains a “serious challenge” as there has been no real commitment to recognition and reparations for people of African descent, a United Nations expert panel said today in Washington D.C., at the end of its second official visit.
UN Photo/David Mutua
UN Photo/David Mutua

Racism will not disappear from football stadiums ‘by magic,’ warns UNESCO report

30 November 2015
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) and the professional Italian association football club Juventus have issued the first exhaustive overview of the effort to tackle and root out discrimination and racism in the world’s most popular spectator sport.
UNICEF Good Will Ambassador, Harry Belafonte, addresses event “Confronting Silence Perspectives and Dialogue on Structural Racism against people of African Descent Worldwide,” November 3, 2015. Video capture UN TV

‘Racial superiority’ myth must be debunked, experts tell UN event on challenges faced by people of African descent

3 November 2015
Debunking the myth of racial hierarchy, United Nations experts on racial discrimination today said that it is imperative to deconstruct, on a global scale, the ideological myth of a superior race and the resulting conviction of a superior culture.
Photo: OSCE
OSCE

UN rights office deplores racist incident in build-up to European football match

20 February 2015
The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) has strongly condemned the racist behaviour exhibited by fans of the English football club, Chelsea, during the lead-up to a European match in Paris, France, and urged authorities to “re-energize” their efforts in combatting intolerance.