A/75/329 complications of COVID-19. This conflicts with Islamic religious practice, and was widely seen as a manifestation of the institutionalized discrimination against the minority Muslims rather than as a public health measure. 28 Four special rapporteurs of the Human Rights Council issued a joint communication to the Government of Sri Lanka on 8 April 2020, raising the concern that the rule was a violation of freedom of religion, and drawing attention to anti-Muslim hate speech and the stigmatization of Muslims who had tested positive for COVID-19.29 67. The European Roma Rights Centre reported that, without evidence, a Bulgarian far-right politician had singled out Roma neighbourhoods as “nests of contagion” to be quarantined. 30 Some mayors had responded by imposing restrictions on Roma settlements with no recorded cases of COVID-19.31 While general restrictions on movement were introduced and widely perceived as a necessary response to contain the spread of the virus, the quarantine, curfew and blockading of Roma neighbourhoods marked an “ethnicization of the pandemic”. The European Roma Rights Centre noted that “the measures were deemed to be disproportionate, unrelated to actual infection rates, and later acknowledged to have been largely ineffective”. 68. While antisemitism, Islamophobia, xenophobia and racism are indeed central, neo-Nazism and ethnonationalism also embrace homophobia and discrimination against persons with disabilities. In Uganda, for example, LGBTQ persons have been blamed for the COVID-19 virus, with some saying that it is divine punishment for homosexuality and abortion. 32 The Fund for Global Human Rights reports that emergency measures have been exploited by authorities to target marginalized LGBTQ youth, who are particularly vulnerable to prejudice and rely on homeless shelters for safety – especially during periods of crisis, such as in a pandemic. 33 69. There has been a racially disparate impact from the COVID-19 virus within the labour force sector. As the Chinese and Southeast Asian Legal Clinic and the Chinese Canadian National Council for Social Justice reported in their submission for the present report, a survey conducted in mid-April in Manitoba, Canada, found that one in five front-line health-care support workers of Asian heritage reported having experienced racism in the workplace in recent months. During the same period, only 1 per cent of non-Asian respondents reported being the target of racism in the workplace. 34 70. According to Adalah, the Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, economic measures taken by the Government have had a disproportionate impact on Palestinian citizens of Israel due to existing structural discrimination and socioeconomic gaps. 35 Significant numbers of Palestinian citizens are not employed as permanent employees, and are therefore more vulnerable to lay-offs during the pandemic. At this time, such short-term employment effects the eligibility of many __________________ 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 20-11206 Ibid., p. 4. See https://spcommreports.ohchr.org/TMResultsBase/DownLoadPublicCommunicationFile?gId =25175. European Roma Rights Centre submission. See https://spcommreports.ohchr.org/TMResultsBase/DownLoadPublicCommunicationFile?gId =25254. For the response from the Government of Bulgaria, see https://spcommreports.ohchr.org/ TMResultsBase/DownLoadFile?gId=35362. Equal Rights Trust submission, para. 20 (citing the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, “COVID-19 and the human rights of LGBTI people”, 17 April 2020) and para. 22. Fund for Global Human Rights, “Update: Ugandan activists rally to defend arrested LGBTQ youth”, 9 June 2020. Joint submission by the Chinese and Southeast Asian Legal Clinic and the Chinese Canadian National Council for Social Justice. Submission from Adalah, the Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel. 15/23