A/50/476 English Page 21 racial discrimination, phenomena which many Governments believe should be written off as things of the past, denying their persistence or describing as "natural" the economic and social conditions of ethnic, racial and religious minorities and indigenous populations. Thus, the consequences of the slave trade, the practice of slavery, and the genocide of indigenous peoples persist, and, as if by chance, the poorest population groups in many countries prove to be, according to official explanations, the descendants of slaves, or indigenous populations which have been colonized. Marginalization, which nowadays takes the form of exclusion, is the result of those practices, and can therefore be said to be founded upon racism. It is perpetuated from generation to generation; racial discrimination has become a commonplace, unacknowledged yet explained in terms of economic and socio-cultural factors. Thought and practice are locked in a truly vicious circle. Is this not an insidious, structural form of racism or racial discrimination, in all conscience? 4. Various forms and manifestations of racism and racial discrimination 50. Here we shall examine those forms and manifestations of racism and racial discrimination which do not affect the groups explicitly designated by the Commission on Human Rights (Blacks, Arabs, and Jews). 51. Crimes and human rights violations persist in the former Yugoslavia in the name of "ethnic cleansing", which has now become a commonplace term, although, fortunately without the acquiescence of the Special Rapporteur on the Situation of Human Rights in the Territory of the Former Yugoslavia, who has resigned. The fire smouldering in Burundi, fed by the tension between the Hutu and the Tutsi, gives rise to fears of a new wave of ethnic conflagrations on the African continent. 52. In certain European countries, the situation has deteriorated markedly and it is no longer shameful to admit that one is a "racist", as in France, where, according to an opinion poll published in the newspaper Le Monde on 22 March 1995, only 36 per cent of the French consider that they never make racist remarks or have racist attitudes. 53. According to the 1994 report of the French Commission nationale consultative des droits de l’homme, skinheads perpetrated 17 racist acts in 1993, that is to say, one half of the racist acts committed in France in that year. 18/ 54. In Germany, the Netherlands, France, and the United States, neo-Nazi groups and parties are emerging - or re-emerging under a new name after having been banned - and are continuing to display openly their attachment to fascist beliefs. Although the racist activism of such groups is more visible and less overtly respectable than that of the traditional parties, it is important not to overlook the role played by the "institutional" racist parties in reducing racism to a commonplace. Such parties include the Front National in France and the Vlaams Blok in Belgium, whose ideas have contaminated the political platforms of other, more moderate parties, which, for purely demagogic reasons, have taken up the arguments in favour of exclusion and mistrust of foreigners, /...