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UN Committee slates Holland

01 November 1993

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In August 1989 LK, a partially disabled Moroccan citizen living in the Netherlands, went to look at a house he and his family had been offered by the council. He was met by a "reception committee" of local whites shouting "No more foreigners". They threatened to burn the house and damage his car if he moved in.

LK demanded that the police prosecute the racists for incitement to racial hatred. The police refused. He went to the Court of Appeal and then to the Prosecutor-General, who all declined to act.

He complained to the UN Committee on the Elimination of all Forms of Racial Discrimination, set up to monitor the Convention of the same name. In a judgment delivered on 16 March 1993, the Committee said that it was not enough to pass laws outlawing racial discrimination; the laws should be used. "When threats of racial violence are made, and especially when they are made in public and by a group, it is incumbent on the State to investigate with due diligence and expedition," it said. It found that the authorities of the Netherlands had not done this and had responded inadequately, and recommended that they review their policy and procedures concerning the decision to prosecute and that they compensate LK for the "moral damage" he suffered.

Human Rights Law Journal, vol 14 nos 7-8, 30.9.93.

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