The fight against hate crime, discrimination and hate speech needs effective and coherent disaggregated data collection in order for responsible authorities and civil society to improve their efforts to present these phenomena and to support victims. Lack of coherent information on cases of hate crime, discrimination and hate speech, as well as legislative gaps and lack of capacity were mentioned as some of the key challenges in this field. On contrast, civil society has developed tools for NGOs to collect data which could provide inspiration to other bodies. The expected revised legislation on equality and the revised criminal code are likely to offer a stronger basis for acting against hate crime, discrimination and hate speech, the meeting participants concluded.

The regional Partnership for Good Governance II project “Strengthening access to justice for victims of discrimination, hate crime and hate speech in Eastern Partnership countries” will support national entities through expertise, training and support to awareness-raising in 2019-2021.

The meeting of national stakeholders was organised on 3 July 2019, in co-operation with the Ministry of Justice, and brought together a multi-stakeholder group, including representatives of Human Rights Defender, the Special Investigation Service, the Judicial Department, the Police, the Prosecutor’s Office, the Investigative Committee, the Ministry of Justice, PINK Armenia, Non-discrimination and equality coalition, Free Citizen NGO and New Generation NGO.

A similar methodology is being proposed in two other countries of the project, namely Republic of Moldova and Armenia. Through this type of activities, the PGG II project “Strengthening access to justice through non-judiciary redress mechanisms for victims of discrimination, hate crime and hate speech in Eastern Partnership countries” aims to improve the application of anti-discrimination legislation and its monitoring and to build public awareness among the general public and vulnerable communities of existing redress mechanisms to discrimination, hate speech and hate crime.

The Partnership for Good Governance II is funded by the European Union and the Council of Europe; and implemented by the Council of Europe.