Tag: Ukraine

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MINORITY AND INDIGENOUS COMMUNITIES: FOR A JUST PEACE

The Minorities for Peace initiative has concluded a groundbreaking peacebuilding project that brought together displaced minority and indigenous community leaders from Eastern Europe, with a focus on Ukraine and the Russian Federation, in the wake of Russia’s invasion against Ukraine.

On the occasion of the United Nations’ International Day of Peace (21 September), the initiative announced a comprehensive theoretical framework for peacebuilding in conflict/post-conflict settings, available in multiple languages, including endangered ones such as Buryat and Roma-Laesh. The document is published on the project’s website: www.minoritiesforpeace.org .

Refugees are not a uniform group. The refugees from Ukraine include members of ethno-cultural minorities and faith groups (e.g. Roma, Jews, Muslims), indigenous people (Crimean Tatars) as well as migrants from Africa and Asia. Moreover, those who have left Russia in protest against the war include members of ethnic and religious minorities as well as indigenous peoples. The Minorities for Peace initiative aims to build a culture of peace through empowering refugees who represent minorities and indigenous communities as agents of peace and dialogue in the region marred by war. Supported by the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association, Exult! Solutions, Rotary International through its partnership with the Institute for Economics and Peace, and other partners, the project has promoted trust and cooperation among communities divided by conflict.

Since March 2024, 111 participants from 27 minority and indigenous community groups took part in a series of online trainings, in-person seminars in Warsaw (Poland) and Chisinau (Moldova) as well as global online sessions connecting experts and minority communities from Asia, Africa, and Europe which took place in January and September 2025. An estimated 1,500–2,000 people were reached additionally through local networks and partner organizations.

The project trained and empowered minority community leaders through equipping them with knowledge about the Positive Peace pillars, the concept of Dealing with the Past (DwP) – including the right to justice for war crimes, and mediation as a method in various walks of life. During the project, new partnerships were formed with organizations including the Ukrainian Centre of Romani Studies, the Free Buryatia Foundation, Moldova for Peace, Roma Women Platform ROMNI, Environmental Association of River-Keepers Eco Tiras, International Mediation Campus, among others. Moreover, seven minority-led projects were developed by the participants, with a focus on developing their activity in the future.

PARTICIPANT TESTIMONIES

‘Being involved in the project inspired me to create my own peace project for my community’ – Beryvan Avdoian, Yezidi community of Ukraine.

‘Peace is respect for each other’s choices and non-violence. Minorities can show by their own example that a tolerant society is possible’ – Aleksandra Garmazhapova, founder of Free Buryatia Foundation.

‘Before the project, I perceived peace as simply the absence of war. Now I understand peace as a process of dialogue, mutual respect, and overcoming divisions’ – Evghenii, human rights defender, Moldova.

‘Participation in the project inspired me, and through me my friends, to dedicate a radio program to the topic of peace. We wanted to show that there are people speaking directly and demanding peace’ – Tjan Zaochnaya, Itelmen community (indigenous ethnic group of the Kamchatka Peninsula).

ADDITIONAL COMMENTS

‘This project showed that even in the times of war, communities are willing to come together, listen to one another, and build bridges across divides’ – Rafal Pankowski, co-founder of the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association.

‘Minorities and indigenous people possess unique knowledge, skills, and experiences that can benefit each society going through conflict and in post-conflict settings. This is what we wanted to highlight through this project’ – Natalia Sineaeva, Minorities for Peace project manager and UN OHCHR Minority Fellow (2024).

‘The project has shown that peace frameworks can be adapted across different regions. We have so many conflicts and tensions worldwide, including in Asia, so we see the need to bring the Minorities for Peace framework to other contexts’ – Rukmini Iyer, project partner, Exult! Solutions, India.

The ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association is an independent civil society organisation founded in Warsaw in 1996. It has campaigned against racism, antisemitism, and xenophobia, for peace, intercultural dialogue, and human rights across the world.

More information:
www.minoritiesforpeace.org
www.NeverAgainAssociation.org
www.facebook.com/Respect.Diversity
www.twitter.com/StowNIGDYWIECEJ
www.linkedin.com/company/never-again-association
https://neveragainnw.bsky.socials

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‘SHOOT THEM’. REPORT ON HATE SPEECH IN THE ELECTION CAMPAIGN IN POLAND

The ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association has published a report entitled ‘«Shoot them.» Hate speech in the election campaign in Poland.’ It documents examples of racist and xenophobic statements about minorities, disseminated for political propaganda purposes.

The report records manifestations of hate speech used by politicians, activists, media, and supporters of particular parties during the election campaign, i.e. from July to October. The publication collects examples of entries on social media platforms, video materials and images, interviews and speeches at rallies, taking aim at Ukrainians, Jews, LGBT people, and people with disabilities, as well as migrants and refugees.

– ‘Never before has hatred towards other people been used so systematically and on such a scale in an election campaign. A ghoulish place in the political messaging was taken by migrants from African and Asian countries who were identified with threats such as terrorism, sexual crime, and theft,’ said Anna Tatar from the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association. She added, ‘It is sad that this type of content was repeated by representatives of all parties.’

– ‘Video materials shared on social media played a particular role in spreading false and harmful image of migrants. Short videos, without any information about when they were recorded, with racist comments, are one of the most common forms of political manipulation,’ said Rafal Pankowski from the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association. ‘Such content subsequently generated hateful comments from more and more users,’ he emphasised.

The ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association participates in the international project SafeNet (Monitoring and Reporting for Safer Online Environments), in which it monitors and reports content propagating hatred towards minorities to social media platforms. In September and October, out of 55 items reported to Facebook, Twitter and YouTube… none of them were removed. The ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association, as a Trusted Flagger, sent reports again to each of these platforms, containing detailed information about posts promoting hate. As a result,… 4 such items were removed.

Selected examples of statements documented in the report ‘«Shoot them.» Hate speech in the election campaign in Poland’:

– On 2 July Roman Giertych, former leader of far-right Mlodziez Wszechpolska (All-Polish Youth) and Koalicja Obywatelska (Civic Coalition) candidate in the parliamentary elections, shared a video on Twitter that showed a group of men chased by the police and added his own comment, ‘Twenty years from now, due to having allowed hundreds of thousands of immigrants from Muslim countries into Poland, we may witness such scenes on the streets of Warsaw.’

– On 8 July, Dariusz Matecki, Prawo i Sprawiedliwosc (PiS; Law and Justice) candidate for the Sejm (lower chamber of Polish Parliament) in the Szczecin constituency, published a comment on Twitter expressing his appreciation for the far-right militants who on 8 July invaded the Pride Fest festival in Tbilisi (Georgia) organised by the LGBT community.

– On 20 July in Bydgoszcz Dr. Slawomir Ozdyk, far-right Konfederacja (Confederation party) candidate in the Sejm elections (lower chamber of the Polish Parliament), presented a xenophobic, even grotesque vision of life in Western European countries. He said, ‘The German mainstream media describe what is happening there by saying that entire city districts have been taken over by migrant gangs. Let me repeat, by Arab-Chechen gangs.’

– On 20 July, Janusz Korwin-Mikke, far-right Konfederacja (Confederation party) MP and its candidate in the Sejm elections in Warsaw suburbs, posted a homophobic entry on Twitter. He declared, ‘Condemning homosexuality is one of the European values.’

– On 26 July, the far right wRealu24 channel on the BanBye platform broadcast a conversation with Dr. Andrzej Zapalowski, Professor at University of Rzeszow and Konfederacja (Confederation party) candidate in the parliamentary elections, made a false statement that ‘well over a million Ukrainian citizens live in Poland at the expense of the Polish taxpayer.’

– On 5 August in Zielona Gora, a huge election banner of MP Lukasz Mejza (unaffiliated, previously associated with the Kukiz’15 movement) appeared, containing xenophobic content. The poster displayed the slogans: ‘Accepting migrants – rape and terror,’ ‘Poland without migrants – safe Poland.’

– On 17 August, during the parliamentary debate, the Minister of Education and Science Przemyslaw Czarnek linked the presence of migrants in Western European countries with sexual crimes against women, ‘Polish women are safe in Poland, because there are no illegal immigrants. […] And you don’t pay attention to the threat and want them to be raped, like in France or Belgium.’

­- On 6 September, Jacek Cwieka, Konfederacja (Confederation party) candidate for the Senate, posted on Twitter that war crimes in Bucha and Irpin [two neighbouring towns in Ukraine where Russian troops have committed mass atrocities against the civilian population] ‘were, after all, a hoax.’ He also spoke in defense of the Russian president, ‘Today, all the inciters are going insane, because there is no evidence to call Putin a war criminal.’

– On 7 September, Adam Gbiorczyk, far-right Konfederacja (Confederation party) candidate for the Senate, published a comment on Twitter in which he questioned the mass extermination in the Nazi camps. He wrote, ‘The mere existence of the camps is not evidence of the death of millions, it is only evidence of the existence of the camps.’ 

– On 17 September, Dr. Krystyna Pawlowicz, Judge of the Constitutional Tribunal and former Prawo i Sprawiedliwosc (Law and Justice) MP, posted a comment on Twitter containing a term that dehumanises refugees and migrants (she called them ‘savages’).

***

In March 2023, the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association published the ‘Brown Book’ – documentation of racist, xenophobic and homophobic crimes and acts of discrimination in Poland in the years 2020-2023. Over 300 pages describe cases of physical assaults on the basis of skin colour, language, or religion, as well as acts of verbal aggression. In addition, the report documents street demonstrations with slogans inciting hatred, acts of discrimination against minorities, and fascist banners displayed at football stadiums. Examples of hostility towards refugees from Ukraine can also be found therein.

The ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association is an independent anti-racist organization founded in Warsaw in 1996. It has campaigned against antisemitism and xenophobia, for peace, intercultural dialogue and human rights both in Poland and internationally. It has actively participated in international civil society networks, including the Global Alliance Against Digital Hate and Extremism (GAADHE) and the International Network Against Cyber Hate (INACH). It takes part in international projects to counter hate speech, Get The Trolls Out and SafeNet.

‘«Shoot them.» Hate speech in the election campaign in Poland’ (full version of the report – PDF).

Additional information:

www.nigdywiecej.org

www.facebook.com/Respect.Diversity

www.linkedin.com/company/never-again-association

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NEW ‘BROWN BOOK’ DOCUMENTS PREJUDICE AND HATE

On the occasion of the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association published the ‘Brown Book’ – documentation of racist, xenophobic and homophobic crimes and acts of discrimination in Poland in the years 2020-2023.

The long-time author of the ‘Brown Book’ was the late Marcin Kornak (1968-2014), founder of the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association, social justice activist and poet. He was the mind behind social campaigns promoting respect and diversity. 20 March marks the ninth anniversary of his death.

The United Nations General Assembly established 21 March as the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination in 1966 to commemorate the Sharpeville massacre in South Africa. On this day in 1960, police opened fire on Black people protesting against apartheid. Sixty-nine protesters were killed and one hundred and eighty were injured. The tragic anniversary is commemorated all over the world to express opposition to racism, discrimination, and xenophobia.

The latest edition of the ‘Brown Book’ on more than 300 pages describes cases of physical assaults on the basis of skin colour, language, or religion, as well as acts of verbal aggression. In addition, the report documents street demonstrations with slogans inciting hatred, acts of discrimination against minorities, and fascist banners displayed at football stadiums. Examples of hostility towards refugees from Ukraine can also be found therein.

– ‘In the Brown Book we paid a lot of attention to online hate speech, including the widely disseminated anti-Ukrainian conspiracy theories, disinformation, and direct abuse against Ukrainians’, said Dr. Anna Tatar, co-author of the report.

– ‘The Brown Book documents negative social attitudes towards minority groups. In this edition of the report, we have described, among other things, attacks on people of Asian origin as well as other minorities who were accused of spreading Covid-19’, said Jacek Dziegielewski from the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association.

Selected examples of events documented in the ‘Brown Book 2020-2023’:

SZCZECIN. In mid-March 2020, unknown perpetrators devastated a plaque with an inscription commemorating the Jewish residents of the city who were murdered during World War II in the Belzec extermination camp. Someone painted a swastika and the SS symbol on the plaque.

LUKOW. On 19 March 2020, three pupils of a local elementary school attacked a fifty-nine-year-old Vietnamese-born resident of the town. They shouted insults, including ‘She comes from China and has coronavirus’, ‘F*ck off you slut!’, and ‘Get the f*ck out of here, you whore, you f*cking Chinese woman!’ The perpetrators hurled stones and litter at her, spat in her direction, and one of them pushed her.

GDANSK. On 20 June 2020, an unidentified assailant attacked a man of Egyptian origin. He yelled at him, ‘Get out from here, you black w*ore’ and punched him in the face. He also tried to stab him with a knife.

WARSAW. On 17 February 2021, a gay couple was attacked. The assailant shouted, ‘Stop holding hands, children are watching’ at the men and stabbed one of them in the back with a knife. The injured man was hospitalized.

POZNAN. On 14 March 2021, on a tram one of the passengers made threats and racist insults towards a Guatemalan man travelling with his wife and child.

SZCZECIN. On 12 December 2021, Konfederacja (Confederation, far-right party) organised a ‘Shooting Competition named after Kyle Rittenhouse’ (Kyle Rittenhouse shot two participants of Black Lives Matter protests in the USA in 2020). The poster announcing the competition contained an image of Rittenhouse with a machine gun and a Confederate flag, a symbol of racial discrimination.

SEDZISZOW MALOPOLSKI. On 13 January 2022, a resident of the town brutally beat a homeless man. He punched him in the face twice, and when the victim fell to the ground, he kicked him unconscious in the head, causing numerous injuries. As a result of this attack, Slawomir K. died after spending several days in hospital.

BIALYSTOK. On 15 January 2022, during the demonstration of COVID-19 deniers, its participants chanted, ‘This is Poland and not Polin!’ (the word means Poland in Hebrew; for the extreme right it has become synonymous with the alleged rule of Jews over Poland).

KATOWICE. On 9 June 2022, at a bus stop and on the bus an unidentified man attacked a teenage boy from Ukraine. He threatened him and hurled xenophobic slurs at him.

LUBLIN. On 30 August 2022, three Black students were attacked by a group of several men. The attackers shouted ‘Black c*nts’ and punched them repeatedly.

WARSAW. On 24 September 2022, the streets of Warsaw witnessed the protest march under the slogan ‘Stop Ukrainization of Poland’, organised by Konfederacja Korony Polskiej (Confederation of the Polish Crown), a far-right party headed by Member of Parliament Grzegorz Braun. The participants unfurled banners ‘This is Poland and not Ukropol!’ (a conspiracy theory claiming that Poland is being overtaken by Ukrainians) and ‘Stop replacing the ethnic structure of Poland’.

LUBLIN. On 7 January 2023, two men attacked a Ukrainian woman, her 13-year-old son and her pregnant daughter. They shouted at them, ‘Ukrainian wh*res’, ‘F*ck Ukrainians’, ‘Get the hell out of Poland’. When the boy tried to call the police, they knocked him to the ground and punched him on the head. They also pushed the pregnant woman. They were charged with publicly insulting the Ukrainian citizens, making death threats, and using violence.

POZNAN. On 7 March 2023, activists of Mlodziez Wszechpolska (All-Polish Youth, a far-right organisation) disrupted a meeting with Ukrainian writer Oksana Zabuzhko. They chanted ‘Poland is for us!’ Meetings with the writer were also disrupted by members of Mlodziez Wszechpolska on 21 November 2022 in Krakow and on 14 February 2023 in Warsaw.

GDANSK. On the night of 11/12 March 2023, two juvenile perpetrators painted a swastika on the entrance to the synagogue in Gdansk-Wrzeszcz. Three ‘K’ letters, which stand for Ku-Klux-Klan, also appeared on the façade.

In April 2022, the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association published a report entitled ‘Let’s Maintain Solidarity with Refugees’ about cases of discrimination and hate speech against Ukrainians, refugees, and ethnic minorities in Poland in the context of the ongoing war. In January 2023, the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association published a report on hate speech as well as antisemitic and anti-Ukrainian conspiracy theories propagated on the Media Narodowe (National Media) online tv channel. After the report had been published, the channel was removed by YouTube.

The ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association is an independent anti-racist organisation founded in Warsaw in 1996. It has monitored hate crimes and hate speech as well as campaigned against antisemitism and xenophobia, for peace, intercultural dialogue and human rights both in Poland and internationally.

From 1 March 2022 to 1 March 2023, data collection for the ‘Brown Book’ was supported by the Henryk Wujec Civic Fund. Henryk Wujec (1940-2020) was an activist of the Workers’ Defence Committee (KOR) in the 1970s, political prisoner in the 1980s, member of the International Auschwitz Council and civil society mentor.

‘Brown Book 2020-2023’ (full version of the report):

https://www.nigdywiecej.org//docstation/com_docstation/172/brown_book_2020_2023.pdf

Additional information:

www.nigdywiecej.org

www.facebook.com/Respect.Diversity

https://twitter.com/StowNIGDYWIECEJ

www.linkedin.com/company/never-again-association

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MUSIC AGAINST WAR

On the first anniversary of Putin’s war, the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association has appealed to the global music community for solidarity with the people of Ukraine and with all the victims of violent conflicts around the world. ‘NEVER AGAIN’ has launched its new initiative, ‘Music Against War’.

The Association has unveiled the emblem of the anti-war campaign, authored by Witold Popiel, a graduate of the Warsaw Academy of Fine Arts and inspired by the logo of  ‘NEVER AGAIN’s long-term campaign ‘Music Against Racism’.

The emblem is available in the blue and yellow colours of Ukraine as well as in black and white. ‘NEVER AGAIN’ encourages musicians, bands, promoters and fans of all types of music to use the symbol freely.

– ‘At the moment when we enjoy our favourite music during a gig or at home, innocent people are dying. We must not ignore it, let’s show solidarity with Ukraine and with all the refugees from war zones’ – call the activists of ‘NEVER AGAIN’. – ‘The Music Against War symbol can be included on a poster for your show, on a record cover, everybody can share it on social media’.

The ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association invites musicians, record labels and promoters who are interested in releasing music tracks or videos as well as organising concerts with the promotional support of ‘Music Against War’ to get in touch via email: info@neveragainassociation.org .

‘Music Against War’ is a continuation of the ‘Music Against Racism’ campaign initiated by the late Marcin Kornak, the founder of the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association. From the age of fifteen, due to an accident, Marcin lived with a physical disability. He was an activist as well as a poet and songwriter who collaborated with independent rock bands. Marcin passed away in 2014 at the age of 46, but his legacy lives on. Over the years, numerous musicians and bands of different genres have supported the ‘Music Against Racism’ campaign.

In 2021, the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association released the historic album ‘One Race – Human Race. Music Against Racism: Part 2’ (previously released in 1998 on CD and cassette), for the first time on vinyl. It features diverse Polish bands as well as internationally renowned anti-racist acts: Chumbawamba and Zion Train. The ‘One Race – Human Race’ record is also available in full on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5m2-fFk2zk .

‘NEVER AGAIN’ is an independent anti-racist organization founded in Warsaw in 1996, which has campaigned against antisemitism, racism and xenophobia, and for peace, intercultural dialogue and human rights both in Poland and internationally.

More information:

www.NeverAgainAssociation.org
www.facebook.com/Respect.Diversity
www.twitter.com/StowNIGDYWIECEJ

www.linkedin.com/company/never-again-association

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ERADICATE HATE GLOBAL SUMMIT

During the Eradicate Hate Global Summit the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association called upon the social media platforms to stop enabling the largest international far-right hate fest.

Co-founder of ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Rafal Pankowski participated in the Eradicate Hate Global Summit held in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (USA) on 19-21 September 2022. The Summit is the most comprehensive anti-hate conference in the world. It unites experts and leaders from around the globe, who are dedicated to eradicating all forms of hate-fuelled violence. The mission of the Summit is to identify and implement effective solutions for collective change.

The speakers at the 2022 Global Summit included the United Nations Special Adviser on the Prevention of Genocide Alice Wairimu Nderitu and Deborah Lipstadt, the US Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Antisemitism.

Rafal Pankowski paid tribute to the victims of the war against Ukraine and said that Putin’s war ‘once again shows what the politics of hate and authoritarianism leads to: mass violence and human suffering’.

In his presentation Pankowski described the growth of the annual far-right march on the Polish Independence Day (11 November) in Warsaw as an example of the growing internationalisation of far-right extremism. The march is organized by Polish extreme-right groups with the participation of numerous racist extremist organizations and activists from across Europe and North America. It has regularly gathered more than 100,000 participants and it has often turned violent. Pankowski referred to the march as a ‘super-spreader’ of hate and ‘Charlottesville on steroids’. In November 2021, the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association and the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism appealed to Facebook and Twitter to stop the promotion and fundraising for the march.

The Eradicate Hate Global Summit grew from the deadliest antisemitic attack in US history. On 27 October 2018, a heavily armed gunman, who earlier had posted online antisemitic and anti-refugee messages, massacred worshippers from three different congregations at the Tree of Life Synagogue. In the aftermath of the attack, the people of Pittsburgh responded in ways that have been described as distinctive in the history of antisemitism. They not only visibly stood in solidarity with the Jewish people, but also offered comfort and aid, and spoke up against hate.

The ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association is an independent anti-racist organization founded in Warsaw in 1996. It is a member of the International Network Against Cyber Hate (INACH) and the Global Alliance Against Digital Hate and Extremism (GADHE). The Association also takes part in international projects to counteract online hate speech such as ‘Get The Trolls Out’.

#eradicatehate

More information:

https://www.nigdywiecej.org/en/our-news/195-articles-from-2021/4727-polish-independence-day-march-likely-to-lead-to-far-right-violence

www.NeverAgainAssociation.org
www.facebook.com/Respect.Diversity
www.twitter.com/StowNIGDYWIECEJ

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During the biggest open-air free music festival in Europe, Pol’and’Rock (4-6 August), also known as Polish Woodstock, the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association organized a football tournament promoting the message of ‘Let’s Kick Racism out of the Stadiums’, involving teenage players who are refugees from Ukraine. Together with the other participants, they manifested their protest against the war.

On another festival day a meeting was held with the rock band Strachy na Lachy (Empty Threats) at the information stand of the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association. For many years, this group has been involved in the activities of the ‘Music Against Racism’ campaign run by ‘NEVER AGAIN’. Krzysztof ‘Grabaz’ Grabowski, the leader of Strachy Na Lachy, explained his band’s involvement in support of the refugees from Ukraine after the outbreak of the war. Some of the musician’s family came from Volhynia (a previously Polish territory, now a region in Ukraine). In press interviews, ‘Grabaz’ emphasised the importance of having neighbours of different nationalities and how it can lead to outbursts of creativity: ‘If in some place different cultures coexist peacefully with each other, then they will undoubtedly develop that place and its culture’.

– ‘During our meeting with Strachy Na Lachy, we talked primarily about war and peace, about respect and prejudice in everyday life, about hate speech and how it can lead to violence. We asked the band to explain how music can create a better world,’ said Joanna Naranowicz, a representative of the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association and the lead singer of the punk band Qulturka.

Strachy na Lachy was established in 2001 by Krzysztof ‘Grabaż’ Grabowski and Andrzej ‘Kozak’ Kozakiewicz who also play in a punk-rock group Pidzama Porno. It is one of the most famous rock bands in Poland. In 2014 the band’s leader, ‘Grabaz’, was awarded with the Officer’s Cross of the Order of Polonia Restituta – one of the highest honours in Poland, for his ‘outstanding merits in creative work and artistic activity’.

During the Pol’and’Rock Festival, the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association had the honour of hosting many other bands of different music styles involved in the ‘Music Against Racism’ campaign.

The ‘Lets’ Kick Racism out of the Stadiums’ tournament has been organised for over twenty years by the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association at the Polish Woodstock/Pol’and’Rock Festival. In 2022 it was co-organized with the grass-roots football team FC GAN Pila and supported by FARE network and the Adidas Football Collective through its grassroots support programme. Tournament’s male and female participants jointly express their support for the ideas that guide the entire festival: peace, friendship and respect for diversity. This year, the message resonated particularly strongly with young players from Ukraine who had had to flee the cruelty of war.

During the Pol’and’Rock Festival, the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association also organised educational workshops on volunteering and supporting refugees. At NEVER AGAIN’s information stand, there were also practical worskhops on designing anti-racist DIY sew-on patches and t-shirts with the use of stencils and paints. The resulting items of clothing with the message ‘Music Against Racism’ were presented to the participants!

The ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association is an independent anti-racist organization founded in Warsaw in 1996. It has campaigned against antisemitism, racism and xenophobia, and for peace, intercultural dialogue and human rights both in Poland and internationally. ‘NEVER AGAIN’ has conducted the first anti-racism campaign in Eastern European football, ‘Let’s Kick Racism Out of the Stadiums’ and is a founding member of the FARE network.

The campaign ‘Let’s Kick Racism out of Stadiums’ was a brainchild of the late Marcin Kornak (1968-2014), who chaired ‘NEVER AGAIN’ for many years. ‘Let’s Kick Racism out of Stadiums’ has run since the mid-1990s with the aim to combat racism and discrimination at stadiums. One of its main components is monitoring and reporting of hate crimes and hate speech cases.

The ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association also encourages musicians, record labels and promoters who are interested in releasing music tracks or videos as well as organising concerts (including online) with the promotional support of the ‘Music Against Racism’ campaign to get in touch via email: info@neveragainassociation.org .

More information:

www.NeverAgainAssociation.org

www.facebook.com/Respect.Diversity
www.twitter.com/StowNIGDYWIECEJ

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ROBERT LEWANDOWSKI SUPPORTS REFUGEES

Robert Lewandowski has officially become an FC Barcelona player and will wear the club’s shirt bearing the logo of the United Nations’ main agency for refugees (UNHCR, Spanish: ACNUR).

As a Barcelona player, Lewandowski will be able to join the fight for the rights of refugee children and youth from across the world. In mid-June, the Catalan club signed an agreement with the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), according to which it will be allocating 400,000 euros a year to humanitarian activities in Colombia, Turkey, Uganda and Malaysia. FC Barcelona’s president, Joan Laporta, has said the priority is to ‘focus on refugees around the world, which is one of the most serious problems that we are currently facing, with 100 million refugees or displaced people (according to UNHCR figures) to whom we need to respond. This figure has increased due to the crisis in Ukraine. With this agreement, UNHCR and FC Barcelona are making an extraordinary commitment to the world.’

The best player in the history of Polish football and the captain of the Polish national team has been supporting for years people who had to leave their homes due to war and persecution. In May 2014, Robert Lewandowski, as the UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador, visited the Syrian refugee camp in Zaatari, Jordan. At that time, over 100,000 people were staying there, more than half of whom were children. The civil war in Syria has been going on since 2011. According to the United Nations, nearly 12,000 children were killed or injured during the war. Lewandowski, together with two boys, Hisham and Mohammad, visited the place where the children spend their free time, which helps them deal with the traumatic experiences. The footballer appealed: ‘We must be open to the children’s voice. Give them your voice, tell your relatives and friends that there are children all over the world who are waiting for our help and interest. Help us tell their story. Your voice is priceless for these children.’

Two days after the start of the Russian invasion, Lewandowski, in a gesture of support for the people of Ukraine, appeared in an armband in the colors of the country’s flag (during the Bundesliga match Eintracht Frankfurt – Bayern Munich). After the match, he posted a comment on Twitter: ‘As an athlete, I can’t pretend nothing is happening. Stand With Ukraine.’ In addition, Lewandowski donated this unique armband to a charity auction. The proceeds (27,000 Polish zloty) were allocated to the purchase of medical first aid materials and their transport to Ukraine. The footballer also played with the Ukrainian yellow and blue armband in the match between the national teams of Poland and Sweden (29 March, the final play-offs for promotion to the World Cup).

However, in reaction to such an open presentation of his anti-war position, Lewandowski was harassed on social media by Polish hooligans and ultra-nationalists. Apart from signs of appreciation for the footballer and expressions of solidarity with Ukraine – there also appeared xenophobic comments. Here are examples of such content published on Twitter: ‘He was a Pole once’, ‘This is no longer our national team. This is a clear betrayal of the country and the fans’, ‘Face next to the shoe and f.ck the sucker who wears foreign colours’, ‘He bowed in front of the Jews in the match so as not to offend them’, ‘Did we have too few gestures of solidarity with the Bandera followers? [Stepan Bandera was the leader of the Organisation of Ukrainian Nationalists; in practice, the term ‘Bandera’ is frequently used in Poland today as an ethnic slur against Ukrainians – editor’s note] What else to come? Maybe we are supposed to unite our countries immediately and create Ukro-polin [Polin in Hebrew means Poland. Ukropolin is a conspiracy theory according to which Poland would be seized by Jews and Ukrainians – editor’s note]’.

The ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association reported a number of the hateful posts to the Twitter administration, some of which have been removed.

In April 2022, the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association published a report entitled ‘Let’s Maintain Solidarity with the Refugees’ detailing incidents of discrimination and hate speech against Ukrainians, refugees and national minorities in Poland in the context of the ongoing war (READ PDF).

The ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association is an independent anti-racist organization founded in Warsaw in 1996. The ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association has conducted the first anti-racism campaign in Eastern European football, ‘Let’s Kick Racism Out of the Stadiums’ and is a founding member of the Fare network. Since 2005, it has led the ‘Racism-Delete’ campaign, which has the objective of removing antisemitic and racist content from the internet. The ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association is a member of the International Network Against Cyber Hate (INACH) and the Global Alliance Against Digital Hate and Extremism (GADHE). The Association also takes part in projects to counteract online hate speech such as ‘Get the Trolls Out’ and ‘Open Code for Hate-Free Communication’.

More information:

www.nigdywiecej.org

www.facebook.com/Respect.Diversity

www.twitter.com/StowNIGDYWIECEJ

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GLOBAL ALLIANCE AGAINST DIGITAL HATE AND EXTREMISM

This week the Global Alliance Against Digital Hate and Extremism held its inaugural event and sent a letter to major tech companies demanding they take action to protect their users and inclusive democracies around the globe.

The event, entitled ‘The Urgent Need for Action Against Online Harms: Global Stories From Frontline Activists’, was held virtually. Speakers included Alliance members, researchers, and people directly harmed by online hate from Iraq, Poland, Myanmar, and the United States.

‘We have come together to demand action and transparency from tech companies,’ said Wendy Via, co-founder of the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism. ‘Tech companies say they are doing what they can, they say their policies are global, but the truth is that there is not enough transparency in how tech companies designate dangerous organizations, too many authoritarian leaning politicians continue to enjoy dangerous exemptions, and content moderation and user safety in non-English languages is light-years behind. All of this is causing real harm around the world.’

The speakers’ stories exemplified how tech companies are complicit in the spread of real life hate, violence, and extremism, and speakers implored tech companies to take immediate action in the name of safety for people around the world.

Ro Sayedullah with Rohingya Student Network and Lucky (last name withheld for security reasons), Rohingya activist and student, shared their experience of living through a genocide in which Facebook played a role.

‘Facebook destroyed our life,’ said Lucky. ‘It changed our life into an unacceptable situation. Facebook knows what it did to us, but is still not listening to our voices. Facebook is rejecting our call. Let’s get hand in hand to fight against Facebook’s oppression.’

‘The contributions of Facebook have created hell for us,’ said Sayedullah. ‘I will not give up, I will fight and will inspire people continuously to fight against the human rights violations of Facebook.’

The wide array of speakers showed how widespread the problem of digital hate is throughout the globe, and how people everywhere are actively harmed by tech companies inaction – from genocide, to online harassment, to real-life discrimination, to far-right and anti-democratic events.

‘The vile pro-war propaganda of the Putin regime was enabled on global social media platforms and the companies have been slow to remove it,’ said Rafal Pankowski, co-founder of the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association in Poland. ‘In fact, contrary to the platforms’ claims, it is often still present there. Moreover, far-right disinformation and incitement against the refugees from Ukraine is rampant and the platforms again fail to react.’

Another speaker, Hayder Hamzoz, founder of Iraqi Network for Social Media, said ‘hate speech on the Internet in Iraq has kidnapped the lives of our friends, and strong voices like Dr. Reham Yaqoob who fought for human rights and women’s voices. Social media companies must bear responsibility for the double standards they follow in content moderation and deliberate ignorance of the hate speech on their platforms in our region’.

While people in the United States and the Global North also been harmed by online violence and hate, the people and communities in the Global South are particularly harmed by the tech companies’ inaction.

The Steering Committee of the Alliance also sent a letter laying out demands to tech companies on Tuesday to Meta (Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp), Twitter, TikTok, Google, and YouTube. The letter asked tech companies to ensure that their policies, community standards, and algorithms are designed to minimize harm and that those policies are appropriately and globally enforced.

According to the letter, ‘real-world, systemic issues – from far-right extremism to genocide to caste and religious discrimination to gender bias and racism – are made worse by the business practices of major internet and social media companies. We cannot strengthen democracies and protect human rights while companies amplify and reward hate and extremism.’

Specifically, in the letter, the Alliance asked tech companies to take the following actions:

– End exemptions from content moderation for the politically powerful and influencers globally and implement fact-checking for all political ads.

– Clarify and improve definitions of ‘dangerous individual and organization’ designations and ensure their enforcement, with the input of civil society and experts, not only in the U.S. and Europe, but in the Global South. For those companies that do not have such a policy, we strongly believe one must be put in place.

– Expand and ensure proportionate resources for content moderation in all languages and cultural competency for all regions of the world where your business operates.

– Fix and design algorithms to end their amplification of disinformation, hate and extremism.

‘Through international collaboration and collective action, we’re confident that we can, and will, achieve transparency from ad tech companies and the more equitable and consistent application of fairer and stronger hate speech and community standard policies across the globe,’ said Bissan Fakih, Senior Campaigner with Digital Action. ‘The time is now.’

Steering Committee members of the Global Alliance Against Digital Hate and Extremism are Avaaz, Digital Action, Equality Labs, Faith Matters, Global Project Against Hate and Extremism, and the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association.

The ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association is an independent anti-racist organization founded in Warsaw in 1996. Since 2005, it has led the ‘Racism-Delete’ campaign, which has the objective of removing antisemitic and racist content from the internet. The ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association is a member of the International Network Against Cyber Hate (INACH). The Association also takes part in projects to counteract online hate speech such as ‘Get the Trolls Out’ and ‘Open Code for Hate-Free Communication’.

More information:

https://globalalliance.tech

www.nigdywiecej.org

www.facebook.com/Respect.Diversity

www.twitter.com/StowNIGDYWIECEJ

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TECH COMPANIES MUST PUT HUMANITY BEFORE PROFIT AND POWER

Statement from the ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association and Global Project Against Hate and Extremism

28 February 2022

As the world watches Putin’s brutal and deadly invasion of Ukraine in horror, tech companies must decide immediately which side of history they are on. They can fulfill their responsibilities as global corporations, on which billions depend, and do all they can to avoid more death and destruction, or they can remain complicit in an illegal act of war that has already led to many deaths, hundreds of thousands of refugees, and massive destruction of cities and towns.

The choice should be an easy one. Tech companies must deplatform Russian propaganda outlets including RT and Sputnik News and key political figures who are spreading hate and disinformation, helping to fuel this war. And search engines need to derank unauthoritative content and disinformation in favor of legitimate sources.

The Putin war propaganda channels are still very prominent on the major social media platforms. Some obvious examples include the Kremlin’s Twitter account, RT and Sputnik’s YouTube channels, and RT and others’ Facebook accounts, among many, many others. This disinformation leads to harms and contributes to the threats against democracies everywhere. These channels and accounts must be removed immediately.

So far, the tech companies have failed to act in any meaningful way. Even as the European Union has banned some Russian propaganda outlets, people across the U.S. and other parts of the globe are being subjected to lies. And dangerous international fascist and white supremacist groups continue to find inspiration in Putin’s propaganda.

Some platforms, including YouTube and Facebook, have announced they will demonetize the Kremlin-funded propaganda machine, RT, but that doesn’t go nearly far enough. We know from experience, and indeed minimum research today, that YouTube is incapable of adequately demonetizing accounts and that Facebook, Twitter, Google, and YouTube are incapable of appropriately labeling accounts with violative content and disinformation. A piecemeal approach by YouTube, Facebook, Google, TikTok, and Twitter is unacceptable. Any channel or account spewing disinformation must be deplatformed altogether, especially those of the politically powerful who would use the loopholes afforded them by companies with a misguided sense of ‘newsworthiness.’

The nearly meaningless steps tech companies have taken since the Russian invasion of Ukraine aren’t good enough, and are a continuation of their failures to protect democracies, users, and the lives that have been lost while they profit. Issuing statements about minimum changes for press coverage is insulting to the world. We’ve seen how discrimination, hate, violence, and even genocide have occurred while big tech fiddles.

This time, these companies must finally step up and do the right thing, take a lesson from the people of Ukraine and all those supporting them, including the Russian peace movement, and put humanity before profit and power.

Launched in 2020, the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE) was founded by Heidi Beirich and Wendy Via to address the gap in efforts to stop transnational hate and far-right extremism movements, particularly US-based activity that is exported to other countries and across borders.

The ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association is an independent anti-racist organization founded in Warsaw in 1996. Since 2005, it has led the ‘Racism-Delete’ campaign, which has the objective of removing antisemitic and racist content from the internet. The ‘NEVER AGAIN’ Association is a member of the International Network Against Cyber Hate (INACH). The Association also takes part in projects to counteract online hate speech such as ‘Get the Trolls Out’ and ‘Open Code for Hate-Free Communication’.

More information:

https://globalextremism.org

www.nigdywiecej.org

www.facebook.com/Respect.Diversity

www.twitter.com/StowNIGDYWIECEJ