On 8 April, International Roma Day, the Council of Europe’s Unit on hate speech, hate crimes and AI organised a workshop for civil society organisations to counter hate speech targeting Roma.

The participants of the workshop learnt to use the Toolkit for human rights speech to civil society organisations and to build counter and alternative narratives which promote equal access to human rights for Roma across Europe.

Sejnur Memishi, a young trainer from Germany, presented his work on promoting Roma culture and heritage, and speaking about Roma people in a dignifying way through his podcast. This example of good practice served as inspiration for the participants to speak up and prepare human rights messages for Roma in their communities.

The workshop held in the Council of Europe’s office in Brussels as a side event to the EU Roma Week was organised in the framework of the joint EU-Council of Europe project “Increasing civil society organisations’ knowledge and capacity to counter hate speech online”. The project aims to increase exchanges of knowledge and strengthen the capacity and coordination between CSOs and other partners who respond to hate speech online using counter and alternative narratives.