A/55/304
being carried out in the face of serious resource
shortages on the part of the Police, it should
further be noted. No impunity is encouraged or
condoned in these or any other acts of violence in
Zimbabwe.
“The Government of Zimbabwe believes
that the land issue cannot be resolved from a
purely legalistic approach. It believes in a holistic
approach, which will not only facilitate the
equitable distribution of land among all the
people irrespective of colour or creed, but which
will also provide a permanent solution that will
not postpone further the redistribution of land, as
happened in 1979 at the Lancaster House
Conference. Discussions between the commercial
farmers and the war veterans have come up with a
solution to the land issue, where a Land
Commission will be set up to look into the
equitable redistribution of land.
“The media has deliberately taken President
Mugabe’s remarks on the land issue out of
context. He has never stated that ‘whites should
leave Zimbabwe’, as you indicate in your letter.
The President has called for only those whites
who have failed to accept reconciliation to leave
Zimbabwe if they so wish.”
25. The Special Rapporteur has taken note of the
Zimbabwean Government’s explanations and has
requested the latter to inform him of the outcome of the
police investigations of the murder suspects and the
charges against the 15 people arrested to date, as well
as the verdicts reached in their trials.
(b) Situation of the Dalits in India
26. The
Special
Rapporteur
continued
his
consultations with the Indian Government with a view
to observing the situation of the Dalits on the ground.
The Indian Government considers that this issue is not
one of racial discrimination, even though the
Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination
holds the opposite view. The Special Rapporteur
nevertheless hopes that the Indian Government will
continue its efforts to promote the integration of the
Dalits into Indian society and calls upon it to combat
the violence perpetrated against them regularly in
several states of the country.
III. Contemporary manifestations of
racism, racial discrimination,
xenophobia and related intolerance
27. The Special Rapporteur would like to stress that
the incidence of violent manifestations of racism, racial
discrimination, xenophobia and anti-Semitism, which
had been on the decline since 1997, has recently risen
alarmingly in a number of countries. Subtle forms of
racism and xenophobia also persist in people’s
everyday lives in several countries. Ethnocentrism and
the political exploitation of ethnicity are increasing
disturbingly in various parts of the world, particularly
in Africa (Great Lakes region) and Asia (Indonesia),
where inter-ethnic wars are continuing and threats of
ethnic warfare have arisen against a political backdrop.
Far-right organizations, neo-Nazis and skinheads are
remobilizing and, alarmingly and on a growing scale,
are engaging in violent mass actions such as attacks on
foreigners and people of colour and the desecration of
Jewish cemeteries and monuments. There are two
broad categories of racism, xenophobia and related
intolerance: (a) racist or xenophobic violence and
activities of far-right, neo-Nazi and skinhead
organizations; and (b) racist propaganda on the
Internet.
A. Racist violence and activities of farright, neo-Nazi and skinhead
organizations
28. During July and August, the international press
reported a resurgence of racist and xenophobic
violence in Germany, both in the east (former German
Democratic Republic) and in the west, in such towns as
Dessau, Usedom, Ludwigshafen, Eisenach, Gera,
Gotha, Düsseldorf and Erfurt. A Mozambican was
beaten to death in Dessau; a residence for asylumseekers was burned down in Ludwigshafen; Africans
were beaten up in Eisenach by young people shouting
Nazi slogans; the synagogue in Erfurt was attacked;
and young neo-Nazis aged 16 to 27 years were jailed in
Gera and Gotha (former German Democratic Republic)
for having assaulted foreigners.
29. Most shocking to international public opinion
was the 27 July attack on the Düsseldorf railway
station, in which 10 members of a group of immigrants
from the former Soviet Union, including six Jews, were
7