ECRI held its 84th plenary meeting, which took place from 1-4 December 2020, through videoconferencing.

During the plenary, ECRI elected Domenica Ghidei Biidu (member in respect of the Netherlands) as 1st Vice-Chair and Michael Farrell (member in respect of Ireland) as 2nd Vice-Chair, as well as Reetta Toivanen (member in respect of Finland) as Bureau member. It also elected Barbara John (member in respect of Germany) and Christian Jura (member in respect of Romania) as members of the working group on relations with civil society and equality bodies. Their respective terms of office begin on 1 January 2021.

On 2 December, ECRI adopted an Opinion on the working definition of antisemitism of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA). The full text of the Opinion is available here.

On 3 December, ECRI held an exchange of views on anti-Muslim racism with Tariq Modood, Professor of Sociology, Politics and Public Policy, Centre for the Study of Ethnicity and Citizenship, University of Bristol (United Kingdom).

ECRI’s working groups on combating intolerance and discrimination against Muslims and on the fight against antisemitism, and the working group on relations with civil society and equality bodies also reported back to the plenary.

During this plenary meeting, ECRI also approved the plans of its Task Force on LGBTI issues. It decided to change the spelling of antigypsyism in its General Policy Recommendation No. 13. Furthermore, it initiated the adoption of its annual report and reviewed the main trends observed during the year 2020.

As regards country monitoring, it adopted its sixth-round report on Norway and the conclusions on the implementation of the interim follow-up recommendations addressed to San Marino and Spain.

Representatives of the Parliamentary Assembly and the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities of the Council of Europe, which have observer status in ECRI, made statements. The representative of the Congress congratulated ECRI on its work and stressed the need for further co-operation, pooling resources and encouraging local and regional authorities to become more involved in the fight against all forms of discrimination and hate speech (for more details, see here).