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OSCE Conference on Tolerance and Diversity

The OSCE Conference on Tolerance and Diversity is taking place at the Federal Foreign Office. Three questions for Gernot Erler, Special Representative of the Federal Government for the OSCE Chairmanship.

19.10.2016
© Stephan Pramme - Gernot Erler

Mr Erler, a large conference is taking place at the Federal Foreign Office on 20 and 21 October 2016 under the German chairmanship of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). Its subject is Tolerance and Diversity. Why is the OSCE occupying itself with this topic while we are facing great challenges, such as terror, migration and unsolved conflicts in Europe?

We assumed the chairmanship of the OSCE this year in order to strengthen the organisation especially to deal with these challenges. The understanding of security within the OSCE is a broad one. It was recognised early on – one trigger here was the wars in the former Yugoslavia at the beginning of the 1990s – that intolerance and discrimination against groups and individuals are not only internal problems of specific countries, but threaten international security as a whole. To that extent, the effort for tolerance and diversity also represents a contribution to solving current challenges to our security.

How exactly then can the OSCE contribute to strengthening tolerance, and what are your expectations of the conference?

The OSCE has a comprehensive catalogue of commitments that very fundamentally affirm equal rights, human dignity and the principle of non-discrimination. Based on this, the OSCE participating states have committed themselves to promoting tolerance and combating discrimination. With the conference we want to show that today’s challenges in our countries and in our shared world cannot be overcome with ethnocentricity, isolation or rejection, but only with tolerance, respect and mutual recognition of equality. We need to treat one another with respect and engage in dialogue to solve our conflicts and problems.

How does tolerance function at a time in which many of the world’s countries are apparently reverting to an era of isolation, and intolerance is perceptibly increasing in our societies?

Tolerance can only function if we orient ourselves towards a firm framework and code of values. This includes principles such as human dignity, basic freedoms, and also democratic governance and the rule of law. For us in Germany that means our Basic Law, but also international treaties and documents such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the OSCE commitments. These also include dialogue and an attempt at mutual understanding. That does not include, however, tolerance of intolerant attitudes, of racism and hate. 

That is why we want to use the time and space the conference provides to exchange views, to learn from other examples and to receive new impulses and ideas. I am thinking here of very concrete projects to promote tolerance, democratic and political education or educational work on human rights, projects that are carried out not only be civil society organisations, but also government institutions. We will also be strongly examining how we can counter the disturbing increase in hate talk and smears, above all on the Internet, and how existing agreements can be better implemented. Above all, however, we should make clear that the diversity of our societies represents a great opportunity if we encounter one another with a genuine understanding of tolerance.

OSCE Conference on Tolerance and Diversity at the Federal Foreign Office in Berlin on 20 and 21 October 2016

www.auswaertiges-amt.de/pressemitteilung

Speech by Foreign Minister Steimeier at the OSCE Conference on Tolerance and Diversity

Speech by Special Representative of the Federal Government for the OSCE Chairmanship in 2016 Gernot Erler

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