ICERD AND ITS MONITORING BODY Article 3 —Racial segregation and apartheid Article 3, which refers to apartheid, may initially have been directed exclusively at Southern Africa. However, the Committee makes it clear that this Article prohibits all forms of racial segregation in all countries, with or without any initiative or direct involvement by the public authorities.12 The Committee observes that: while conditions of complete or partial racial segregation may in some countries have been created by governmental policies, a condition of partial segregation may also arise as an unintended by-product of the actions of private persons. In many cities residential patterns are influenced by group differences in income, which are sometimes combined with differences of race, colour, descent and national or ethnic origin, so that inhabitants can be stigmatized and individuals suffer a form of discrimination in which racial grounds are mixed with other grounds .13 Article 4 —Racist propaganda, organizations and activities The Committee emphasized repeatedly, and notably in General Recommendations, the paramount importance of Article 4, which contains provisions that are of a mandatory character.14 According to this Article and relevant General Recommendations, states parties have obligations to adopt legislation to penalize the following acts: (i) dissemination of ideas based upon racial superiority or hatred; (ii) incitement to racial discrimination; (iii) acts of violence against any race or group of persons of another colour or ethnic origin; (iv) incitement to such acts, and (v) provision of any assistance, including financial, to racist activities. Furthermore, organizations, as well as their activities and propaganda, which promote, foster or incite racial discrimination, must be declared illegal and be prohibited. Belonging to such organizations as well as participating in such activities is in itself also a criminal offence. Article 4 (c) underlines the obligations binding the public authorities at all administrative levels, including the municipal level. Full compliance with Article 4 is particularly complicated in many countries, where governments may consider this provision to unduly restrict freedom of expression and freedom of association. However, the Committee holds that the rights to freedom of opinion, expression and association, are not absolute, but subject to certain limitations. In its General Recommendation XV (42), the 4 Committee expresses the opinion that the prohibition of the dissemination of all ideas based upon racial superiority or hatred is compatible with the right to freedom of opinion and expression, given the saving clause that the obligations of Article 4 should be fulfilled with due regard to the principles embodied in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (Article 19) and the rights expressly set forth in Article 5 of this Convention (first sentence of Article 4), which is to be understood as a reference to freedom of expression and freedom of association. Further, the Committee draws the attention of states Parties to Article 20 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which requires states to prohibit by law any advocacy of national, racial or religious hatred that constitutes incitement to discrimination, hostility or violence. Nevertheless, a number of countries, mainly from the West, made interpretative declarations upon ratification of the Convention emphasizing the with due regard clause. Such a declaration is used by a state to communicate its view and interpretation of this clause. This is to be distinguished from a reservation in international law with which a state, when signing or ratRelevant case — conviction of Jersild, a Danish journalist15 This case illustrates the tensions that exist between the provisions of Article 4 and the right to freedom of expression. Jersild, a Danish journalist, was held criminally liable by the Danish courts under Article 266 (b) of the Penal Code,16 which had been introduced in Denmark to implement Article 4 of ICERD, in conjunction with Article 23 of the Penal Code.17 In a television programme, the journalist had interviewed three members of a racist group, ‘the Greenjackets’, and was accused of aiding and abetting them by allowing and even encouraging highly offensive and racist statements against foreigners and black people. The Danish courts held that the journalist’s actions resulted in the publication of racist statements made by a small number of people. Freedom of expression was not, in the opinion of the courts, a justifiable ground for acquittal in light of the interest in protecting against racial discrimination. In the examination of Denmark’s report in 1990, several members of CERD claimed to be highly satisfied with the results of the case, stating that it was ‘the clearest statement yet, in any country, that the right to protection against racial discrimination took precedence over the right to freedom of expression’.18 Jersild brought the case to the European Court of Human Rights, which decided that the journalist’s right to freedom of expression guaranteed under Article 10 of the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms had been violated. The Court also stated that Denmark’s obligations under this European Convention had to be reconciled with its obligations under ICERD.19 ICERD: A GUIDE FOR NON-GOVERNMENTAL ORGANIZATIONS