The report on racial profiling and homobiphobia in Italy, this time comes from Europe

Racial profiling, xenophobia in the political debate and homophobia in the Ecri report.Among his requests is that of making Unar independent.

Another report from an international institution denounces the systemic racism and racial profiling of the Italian police.After the relationship of the UN Committee for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, is the Council of Europe, in particular the Commission against racism and intolerance (Ecri), with his reports published on 22 October to draft a document on the topic.The report not only talks about racial profiling, but also xenophobia in social contexts, the political debate "with hostile tones towards migrants" and concern towards lgbtqia+ community.

During a trip carried out by one of its delegations, Ecri collected numerous testimonies of episodes of racial profiling by the police, who mainly target ethnic people Rom and the people of African origin.Furthermore, ECRI stated that the Italian authorities “they do not seem to be aware of the relevance of the problem and they did not consider the existence of racial profiling as a potential form of institutional racism."

What does the Ecri report contain?

The long Ecri document contains several recommendations addressed to the Rome authorities for the improvement of the fight against racism and intolerance.One of the pillars of the report is the request for establishment of an independent body for equal opportunities, with the contribution of civil society and to strengthen the National Office against racial discrimination (Unar) as a government body for coordinating anti-racism policies which, being an office directly linked to Palazzo Chigi, cannot be considered autonomous.

Despite the progress made since the last monitoring of 2016, some issues continue to cause concern.As in previous reports it is reiterated that lor legal status and role, although at the forefront in the fight against racism and intolerance, of the Unar as the office of the Presidency of the Council of Ministers, remain incompatible with the fundamental requirement of independence of an equal opportunities body.According to Ecri, the lgbtqia+ people they continue to suffer prejudice and discrimination in daily life, and the procedure for legal recognition of gender change continues to be complicated, long and excessively medicalised.

Law enforcement and racial profiling

The work of the police continues to cause great concern, especially regarding the racial profiling.According to the official definition of Council of Europe , "ethnic or racial profiling is defined in the context of police activities, when the forces carry out control, surveillance or investigation operations, based on reasons linked to ethnicity, skin colour, language, religion, nationality or national origin without any objective and reasonable justification."

The relationship cites a study conducted among immigrants in 2022, in which the 45.8 percent of those interviewed declared that, among all public institutions, they suffered the greatest discrimination in police stations.A previous study published in 2018 by the European Union agency for fundamental rights reports how in Italy "among those who were stopped in the twelve months preceding the survey, the 70 percent believes that the latest arrest was motivated by racial reasons."

Common examples reported in the report include refusal of the asylum application without reason, destruction of documents, verbal abuse and, in some cases, violent abuse.Police were also accused of verbal and physical abuse during the operations in Roma camps.The Commission underlined that from an institutional point of view very little has been done to ensure greater responsibility in cases of racist or homobitransphobic abuse committed by agents of the State Police, Carabinieri and various law enforcement agencies.

Hate speech

One of the topics that created the most stir within the political debate of this report are the Commission's declarations regarding public utterances from the political world.The main concerns focused on increasingly xenophobic statementsand and with highly divisive and discriminatory tones by some political figures in particular against refugees, asylum seekers and migrants, as well as citizens Italians with a migratory background, the community Rom and the community lgbtqia+.But also the attacks on judges, in particular those who deal with migrants, have received attention because they put the efficiency and independence of the judiciary at risk.

While not mentioning politicians by name, the report refers to examples, like that of the city councilor of Florence Alessio Di Giulio who, ahead of the 2022 general election, posted a video of a Roma woman online with a caption encouraging people to vote for her party so they would “never see her again”.The counselor was then convicted of inciting racial hatred.But it also refers to a book published by the general Roberto Vannacci in 2023 that contains racist and homophobic comments.

The reactions of politicians

Italian leaders did not accept the accusations.The President of the Council Giorgia Meloni he staunchly defended the police force.The Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani it was said outraged by the report and instructed Italy's representative at the Council of Europe, Roberto Martini, to express the government's "profound disdain" for the report, reiterating that, in his opinion, there is no problem of racism in Italian police forces. Matteo Salvini, Minister of Transport and leader of the League, declared that the police force had been "dragged through the mud" by a "useless" organisation, also making problematic remarks about the Roma community.

The President Mattarella he called to the Chief of Police, the prefect Vittorio Pisani, expressing his astonishment at the statements contained in the report of the Commission against racism and intolerance of the Council of Europe and reiterating his esteem and closeness to the Police forces.Even if, from the reactions on the web, it is thereor the President's amazement at having affected part of public opinion, especially those who deal with systemic discrimination in our society.