A/HRC/11/36/Add.2 page 19 74. The Special Rapporteur notes that the silence and invisibility of the victims also translates into a lack of census information or statistics disaggregated by descent or ethnic origin and the absence of any complaints of discrimination before the domestic courts. He recalls in that regard that the fact that victims do not apply to the courts does not necessarily mean there are no such cases; it could be attributable to several factors, including the victims’ lack of resources, particularly those who do not have a good command of Arabic and cannot afford an interpreter, lack of awareness of the remedies available to them, mistrust of the public authorities, or lack of awareness of the issues relating to racial discrimination. 75. While fully aware that Mauritania is a developing country where poverty and inequalities persist, and that the current reforms require considerable economic and financial resources, the Special Rapporteur nevertheless underscores the overlap in Mauritanian society between the distribution of socio-economic marginalization and that of ethnic groups and communities. In the Special Rapporteur’s view this overlap is a characteristic indicator of the depth of racism in some societies. The increasing concentration of black Africans in particularly deprived neighbourhoods and their prevalence in the main prison in Mauritania illustrate that situation. 76. On the legal level, the Special Rapporteur notes firstly that only the Labour Code contains a definition of discrimination resembling that contained in the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination and secondly that, despite the important new laws adopted recently there is a lack of practical supporting and implementing measures, in particular with regard to slavery. In that context, he stresses the need to take into account the profound effect slavery has had on attitudes and behaviours, and to implement practical and effective measures to help address and resolve the limits to legal liberation typically encountered by slaves who do not have the material or financial means to look after themselves and successfully integrate into society. 77. Lastly, the Special Rapporteur underscores the flaws in the intellectual and ethical strategy aimed at tackling root cultural causes of discrimination. Particularly important is the absence of collective memory work on the gravest violations of human rights; for example, the massacre of black Mauritanian officers and soldiers and the expulsion to Senegal and Mali of thousands of Mauritanians, most of them from the black Mauritanian community, as a result of ethnic violence. V. RECOMMENDATIONS 78. The Special Rapporteur recommends the adoption by the Mauritanian Government of a dual strategy - political, legal and institutional, on the one hand, and cultural and ethical, on the other - in order to combat the manifestations of ethnic or racial discrimination that have deeply marked Mauritanian society. 79. On the political front, the Special Rapporteur recommends that the executive, the legislature and the judiciary should restate, publicly and consistently, their political determination to combat all forms of racism and discrimination and, in the long term, to promote democratic, egalitarian and participatory multiculturalism based, on the one hand, on the recognition, respect and promotion of cultural diversity and, on the other, on the systematic encouragement of interaction and cross-fertilization between the