Wiesenthal Centre's Request to Spanish Foreign Minister Becomes a Parliamentary Question

PARIS – The Simon Wiesenthal Centre last week contacted a number of Foreign Ministers, Secretaries of State and aPrime Minister, urging them to boycott the “celebration” of the 20th anniversary of the UN World Conference Against Racism.

Held in Durban, South Africa, in September 2001, the first WCAR degenerated into an antisemitic hatefest.

Durban II in 2009 – held in Geneva – and III in 2011 – in New York – were opened by then Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, arecidivist Holocaust denier and an arch-hatemonger against Jews.

Dr. Shimon Samuels, the Centre’s Director for International Relations, welcomed the fact that, “Our letter to Spain has had aneffect. On 1 March, Deputies representing the Partido Popular (PP), the main opposition party in Congress, registered a written Parliamentary Question, asking the Government to state its positionregarding ‘celebrating’ Durban’s 20th anniversary, and its opinion concerning the different editions from 2001 until today. The Spanish Government must present a written response.”

“We are eager to read the Government’s response to the question,” concluded Samuels.

For further information contact Dr. Shimon Samuels at csweurope@gmail.com, join the Center on Facebook,or follow @simonwiesenthal for news updates sent directly to your Twitter feed.

The Simon Wiesenthal Center is one of the largest international Jewish human rights organizations with over 400,000 member families in the United States. It is an NGO at international agenciesincluding the United Nations, UNESCO, the OSCE, the OAS, the Council of Europe and the Latin American Parliament (Parlatino).