Racism and Fascism in Austria

[Chris Burford <cburford@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Concrete evidence of racism and fascist trends in Austria -

In view of the debate about Haider, I think the list should consider the
facts and the arguments in the below.

It was forwarded to me by the National Civil Rights Movement (started
last year in Britain as a result of a number of cases of police
acquiescence in racism). It is from 


> National Coalition of Anti-Deportation
> Campaigns (NCADC)
>
> Web site: 
> http://www.ncadc.demon.co.uk/


Quoting Amnesty International, Austria.



Chris Burford
London


>      The report covers
> incidents that happened before the current
> government was sworn in. But human rights organisations fear that
> the
> rise of the far right has given _expression_ to passive racism in
> Austria.


> Rampant racism against Immigration detainees
> by Austrian police exposed
>
>      Black detainees kicked, beaten and punched, says
> Amnesty
>
>      Kate Connolly in Vienna:  Saturday March
> 25, 2000
>
>      Austrian police have been accused of seriously
> flouting human
> rights, abusing their powers and using brutal language and
> behaviour
> in their treatment of foreigners, in a report released by Amnesty
> International in Vienna yesterday.
>
>     The damning account said a strong inbuilt racism
> existed within
> the police force.


>      The report was
> published on the same day as a 31-year-old police
> officer appeared before a Vienna court charged with grevious bodily
> harm over the beating of a young black African man.
>
>      The policeman is alleged to have hit the
> 18-year-old around the
> genitals with a baseball bat before arresting him in
> September last year on suspicion of drugs possession. 


>      The Amnesty report
> said detainees were often denied access to
> lawyers, doctors or friends, and foreigners, particularly black
> Africans, had been beaten unconscious for not showing police their
> papers.


>    The focal point of Amnesty's
> allegations is the case of Marcus
> Omofuma, a Nigerian asylum seeker, 25, who died while being
> deported
> from Vienna to Sofia in May last year. He was bound and gagged
> "like
> a mummy stuck to the seat" by the three officers who accompanied
> him,
> and arrived unconscious in Sofia where doctors pronounced him dead.
> No charges were brought.
>
>      "Investigations into police ill-treatment
> have been slow, lacking
> in thoroughness and often inconclusive," said Mr Patzelt. Often,
> when
> complaints were made, the police brought counter-charges and more
> often than not won.


>      Illegal raids on
> asylum homes were also being regularly reported,
> he said, citing an incident which occurred after the report was
> completed, in January this year, when police raided the home of
> black
> Africans in Traiskirchen.
>
>      "One hundred and forty police stormed the
> home looking for drugs
> but nothing was found," he said. "They then carried out painful
> anal
> searches, simply because there was some suspicion that there might
> be
> drugs there. All you need is a black face to be considered
> suspicious." 


>     In what is being seen as a
> timely move, the EU has chosen to base
> its new racism monitoring centre in Vienna. "It wasn't placed
> here
> because Austria is seen as being racist," insisted EU spokesman
> John
> Kellock, "but if it steps out of line, we'll haul them over
> the
> coals."
>
>      The Freedom party and People's party are the
> only government
> parties in the EU not to have signed up to the EU's charter against
> racism because their policies contravene some of the
> clauses.


>     Fears that intolerance is
> on the rise in Austria increased this
> week when the head of the evangelical church, Bishop Gertraud
> Knoll,
> said she was going into hiding with her three children because she
> could no longer stand the violent and sexually abusive letters
> delivered to her home in Burgenland.
>
>      Bishop Knoll, 41, has been a staunch critic of
> the Freedom party
> and its racist politics for years.


> Amnesty International Press Release  24
> March 2000


> In November 1998, Dr C, a black Austrian
> citizen, was stopped by
> police after reversing his car into a one-way street and was asked
> "Why are you driving the wrong way, Nigger?" The police
> officers reportedly pushed Dr C into a bush of thorns, beat him
> unconscious, handcuffed him and continued to beat him after he
> regained consciousness. Dr C's wife claims one of the police
> officers shouted to his colleague; "Make him lame until he can
> no
> longer walk". After being arrested, Dr C was so badly beaten, he
> was
> taken to hospital where he spent 11 days recovering.


> Police officers entered a Chinese restaurant
> in July 1998 and
> demanded identity papers from employees. The cook, a Chinese
> national, was reportedly dragged out of the kitchen, beaten and put
> into a headlock for not producing his papers. 


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