General News
16% of Europeans claim experiencing discrimination: survey
Around one in six people in Europe claimed to have personally experienced discrimination in the past year, according to an opinion survey released by the European Commission on Monday.
About 16 percent of the respondents reported experiencing discrimination on the basis of race, religion, age, disability or sexual orientation in 2009, with age discrimination being the most common one, according to the survey conducted between May 29 and June 15 in 2009 in 30 European countries.
Although the figure of personal experience of discrimination remained largely the same as in 2008, there has been a strong increase in perceived discrimination based on age and disability.
Among the 26,756 respondents, 58 percent considered age discrimination to be widespread in their country, compared to 42 percent in 2008, while 53 percent cited disability discrimination.
The survey also saw a clear link between the perceived discrimination with the current economic situation, with 64 percent of people expecting the economic slowdown to result in more age discrimination in the job market.
"These results show that despite progress, we still have a long way to go in making people more aware of their rights to equal treatment, particularly at national level and ensure that equality remains not just an empty phrase, but becomes reality," said Equal Opportunities Commissioner Vladimir Spidla.
It is the third Special Eurobarometer survey carried out by the European Commission on attitudes to discrimination in the European Union (EU). Its main objective is to track perceptions of people in Europe toward different forms of discrimination and diversity.
The survey came ahead of this year's European Equality Summit, to be organized on Nov. 16-17, 2009 by the Swedish Presidency of the EU and the European Commission. It will be the third EU Equality Summit in Stockholm.
Source: Xinhua
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