Conference boycott

Germany announced Friday that it will not take part in an international anti-racism conference to be held in New York later this month.

"We cannot rule out that the Durban conference in New York will be tainted by anti-Semitic comments as was the case on previous occasions," Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle said in a statement.

"That is why Germany will not participate in this event. This is also an expression of our responsibility, particularly with respect to Israel."

The United Nations General Assembly has set the conference for September 22 to commemorate the first anti-racism conference held in Durban in 2001. That conference ended in bitter disputes and walkouts over a plan to include condemnations of Zionism in the final text.

Second conference hijacked

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad used the second conference in Geneva in 2009 to launch a verbal tirade against the Jewish state. Germany boycotted that conference.

The Central Council of Jews in Germany and the American Jewish Committee had urged the German government to stay away from this year's conference as well.

In his statement, Westerwelle added that the decision to boycott the conference did nothing to change the German government's commitment to the fight against racism and discrimination.

"Our goal is and remains for German and European human rights policy to finally achieve concrete results in this regard," the statement said.

Israel, the United States, Canada, the Czech Republic and Italy have also said they will boycott the conference.

Author: Chuck Penfold (dapd, EPD, dpa)
Editor: Martin Kuebler