AUSTRIA/FILE: Europe's Muslims face deep-seated discrimination in education, housing and jobs, European Union report says

Europe's Muslims face deep-seated discrimination in education, housing and jobs that can alienate them from the mainstream, but say they could do more themselves to connect with wider society, an EU report said on Monday (December 18). The study by the European Monitoring Centre on Racism and Xenophobia is the first to cover Muslims across the European Union and coincides with growing scrutiny of EU Muslims spurred by terrorism and increased immigration from the Islamic world. The 115-page report coincides with growing scrutiny of EU Muslims spurred by terrorism and increased immigration from the Islamic world. It was accompanied by interviews with mainly young Muslims describing experiences of being marginalised even if they were European-born EU citizens. The EU has 15 million Muslims, the second largest religious grouping in the 25-nation bloc. Presenting dozens of polls and case studies in various EU nations, the report said many Muslims, especially the young, struggled with myriad barriers to social advancement, giving rise to feelings of hopelessness and exclusion. Beate Winkler, Chairman of the European Monitoring Centre On Racism And Xenophobia (EUMC), said Islamophobia, borne of an increasing tendency to associate Muslims in general with terrorist acts by a relative few, had intertwined with pre-existing xenophobia to fan discrimination in many walks of life. "Statistical evidence shows that Muslims in many EU countries have unemployment rates higher than average. They tend to work in lower-paying sectors of the economy. Their educational achievement falls average and they are often disproportionately represented in areas with poorer housing conditions," she said. Such ills have been blamed for rioting in France's heavily immigrant suburbs and violence in Berlin schools. In France, people with purely French names were five times more likely to be invited to job interviews than those with Muslim-sounding names and similar qualifications, Winkler told the news conference. She said Islamophobia included "discriminatory and aggressive treatment by police", a factor cited in youth unrest. In the Netherlands, some young Muslims said they had been placed in school classes segregated along ethnic lines because they were branded foreign, even though they were Dutch-born. The report said Islamophobic acts were mainly verbal rather than physical but remained severely under-reported, making it difficult to develop effective counter-measures. "European Muslims suffer from regular xenophobic behaviour and incidents. Islamophobia is a specific form of racism. It manifests itself in (unintelligible) of the Council of Europe, negative general attitude but also to varying degrees through discrimination acts and through violence or harrassments," said Winkler. Interviewees agreed that Muslim women who wear headscarves had the hardest job getting jobs, saying many employers feared they would drive away customers. Yet Muslims also saw they could do more to help themselves. In interviews, some Muslims said their community mosques were not addressing pressing issues confronting them in secular European society, such as relationships, sexuality and drugs. The report urged EU policymakers to fully apply anti-discrimination directives, mandate diversity training for police, ensure school classes are ethnically integrated, and encourage balanced media coverage to avoid stigmatising Muslims.

ITN Source | December 19, 2006

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