Vienna:
The coronavirus pandemic has had an unprecedented and profound impact on human rights, fuelling racism and kid abuse, the European Union (EU)’s rights agency stated Thursday in its annual report.
“The pandemic and the reactions it triggered exacerbated existing challenges and inequalities in all areas of life, especially affecting vulnerable groups,” a report by the Vienna-based Fundamental Rights Agency (FRA) stated.
“It also sparked an increase in racist incidents,” the FRA added, calling the pandemic’s effects on rights “profound”.
Marginalised groups such as Roma, refugees and migrants had been not only at larger threat of contamination, but also lost jobs owing to strict lockdown measures.
In addition, they had been the targets of “racist and xenophobic incidents, including verbal insults, harassment, physical aggression and online hate speech”, according to proof collected by the FRA and other groups.
In 2020, domestic violence and sexual abuse also improved, the report stated.
It cited sources in the Czech Republic and Germany as saying that calls to national domestic violence hotlines rose by 50 % in the former and by 20 % in the latter among March and June last year.
Child sexual abuse on-line also improved, FRA stated, citing Europol.
The agency urged nations to tackle the pandemic and its “unprecedented collective challenge” to human rights with “balanced measures that are based on law” and which had been “temporary and proportional”.
The report covers the 27 European Union member states, along with North Macedonia and Serbia.