Information document on the fifth monitoring cycle of the European
Commission against Racism and Intolerance (ECRI)
(adopted by ECRI’s Bureau on 28 September 2012, further to the decisions taken
by ECRI at its 58th plenary meeting from 19 to 22 June 2012)
1. ECRI’s fifth monitoring cycle will begin during the first semester of 2013. It will
last five years1.
2. ECRI’s fifth-cycle reports will focus on four topics common for all member States
and a number of topics specific to each one of them.
3. The common topics will be: legislative issues, hate speech, violence and
integration policies.
4. Under legislative issues, ECRI will look into
a. the ratification of Protocol No. 12 to the European Convention on Human
Rights, as a tool for combating discrimination
b. the existence of criminal, civil and administrative law provisions as per its
General Policy Recommendation (GPR) No. 72
c. and the existence and mandate of independent authorities entrusted with
the fight against racism and racial discrimination3, as per its GPR Nos 24
and 7.
5. Under hate speech, ECRI will look into measures taken to deal with forms of
expression that should be criminalised5 and, in general, intolerant and
inflammatory discourse targeting groups of concern to ECRI (vulnerable groups).
6. Under violence, ECRI will look into measures taken to combat actual physical
violence against persons belonging vulnerable groups and/or their property.
7. Under integration policies, ECRI will comment on the adequacy of existing ones
that are or could be relevant for its vulnerable groups; in their absence, ECRI will
make recommendations on policies to be adopted. Although this topic concerns
all groups of concern to ECRI (including historical ethnic, religious and linguistic
minorities and foreigners/migrants), care will be taken to avoid overlap with the
identity issues usually dealt with under the Framework Convention for the
Protection of National Minorities and the European Charter for Regional or
Minority Languages.
1
See § 18.
On national legislation to combat racism and racial discrimination.
3
In line with the definitions in GPR No. 7, all references to these phenomena include grounds such as
“race“, colour, language, religion, nationality or national or ethnic origin.
4
On specialised bodies to combat racism, xenophobia, antisemitism and intolerance at national level.
5
Drawing inspiration from ECRI’s GPR No. 7.
2
8. Through the country-specific topics ECRI will address any other major “racism,
racial-discrimination, xenophobia, antisemitism or intolerance” issues in the
member State concerned. Interim recommendations not implemented or partially
implemented during the fourth monitoring cycle6 will be followed up in this
connection.
9. LGBT issues will be addressed if they are relevant to the overall thrust of the
ECRI’s analysis of the situation in a member State, where they occur under
topics such as hate speech or violence.
10. The number of recommendations in a country report will be fewer than in the
fourth monitoring cycle, more concrete and, to the greatest extent possible,
measureable.
11. New interim recommendations will be made - in principle up to two.
12. Country reports will be adopted following confidential dialogue with the national
authorities. The modalities will be the same as in the fourth monitoring cycle.
13. As in the fourth monitoring cycle, the authorities will be provided - for the
purposes of the confidential dialogue - with a version of their country’s report
provisionally adopted by ECRI (draft report).
14. ECRI, before drafting a country report, will organise a contact visit to the member
State concerned. The modalities of the visit will be the same as in the fourth
monitoring cycle.
15. The fifth-cycle interim recommendations will be followed up in the same manner
as the fourth-cycle ones. ECRI could also envisage the possibility of holding talks
with the authorities on their implementation.
16. Each country report will have five sections:
a summary of ECRI’s findings
a section dealing with the common topics
a section dealing with the country-specific topics
a section dealing with the fourth-cycle interim recommendations that were
not - or not fully - implemented during the fourth monitoring cycle and
e. new interim recommendations.
a.
b.
c.
d.
17. The analytical sections of country reports (b, c and d) will be significantly shorter
than in the fourth monitoring cycle, with a target of a maximum of 20 pages.
18. In principle, fifth-cycle reports will be adopted not later than five years following
the adoption of the fourth-cycle report for each of the member States concerned.
6
Although the fourth monitoring cycle was of a five-year duration, a two-year period had been fixed for the
implementation of interim recommendations by each member State.
19. The modalities of publication of ECRI’s country reports and conclusions on the
implementation of interim recommendations will be the same as in the fourth
monitoring cycle7.
7
According to Article 11 § 3 of ECRI’s Statute, “ECRI’s country reports are published following their
transmission to the national authorities, unless the latter expressly oppose such publication. These reports
shall include appendices containing the viewpoints of the national authorities, where the latter deem it
necessary.” However, national liaison officers will no longer be required to submit the appendices with the
national authorities’ viewpoint before the plenary session during which their country report is to be adopted
by ECRI.