A/77/246 14. The mandatory minimum sentences and zero tolerance policies in some state laws, as well as the “war on drugs” from the 1970s, have had the effect of disproportionally criminalizing large swaths of minority populations. Police killings of and violence and brutality towards African Americans are now of ex tremely grave concern because of more recent high-profile incidents. Available statistics indicate that African American men are almost three times as likely, and Hispanic/Latino men are almost twice as likely, to be killed by police than white men. Indepe ndent and effective oversight of law enforcement is crucial to end such practices. 15. While some states have put in place forms of bilingual education, particularly for their large Hispanic minorities, this is not necessarily, nor even usually, the case for most linguistic minorities. Minority languages such as French for the Cajun minority in Louisiana and the Chamorro language in Guam and neighbouring islands are not widely taught in schools, and their use as a medium of instruction is still fairly limited. This continues to have a detrimental effect on the academic performance of minority children and how they perceive their identity, language and culture. The Special Rapporteur has urged the ratification of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities in order to help protect the linguistic rights of users of sign language. In addition, American Sign Language must be more widely recognized as a language in educational legislation to facilitate its use as a language of instruction. 16. In 2020, hate crimes targeting minorities in the United States rose to their highest level in over a decade, with reported hate crimes motivated by race, ethnicity or religion bias representing approximately 70 per cent of the hate crimes in the country. Anti-Semitism, anti-Asian speech, Islamophobia, derogatory slurs against Hispanic, Arab and other minority communities and anti-immigration xenophobia are surging, sometimes reaching record levels, throughout the country. 17. While religious freedom is guaranteed by state and federal law, domestic legislation does not always clearly protect against discrimination on the basis of religion, as prohibited in international human rights standards. No federal legislation directly and generally prohibits discrimination on the ground of religion or belief, leaving religious minorities vulnerable to discriminatory practices and policies. This also affects non-theists, humanists and atheists in the United States, where Christian bias or favouritism appears to contradict the official secular nature of the State. 18. Minorities such as African Americans, Hispanics, indigenous peoples, the Chamorro people and others are also disproportionally exposed to serious environmental hazards and contamination, including to drinking w ater aquifers. III. Thematic report on the human rights of minorities in the United Nations A. Introduction 19. The year 2022 marks the thirtieth anniversary of the Declaration on the Rights of Persons Belonging to National or Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic Minorities. In the present thematic report, the Special Rapporteur considers critically the treatment of the rights of minorities since the adoption of the Declaration in 1992 and how it has taken shape in the United Nations, as well as how the rights of minorities have been incorporated in recent developments in terms of programmes, new initiatives and guidelines, including in regional and national offices. 6/21 22-11516