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UN official urges sincere fight against racism.

Article Excerpt
OTTAWA

After spending 12 days in Canada in September, the United Nation's special rapporteur on racism, racial discrimination, zenophobia and related intolerance wants to send a message to Canada's federal and provincial governments.

Racism is alive and flourishing in this country, which boasts internationally of its progressive attitudes towards multiculturalism.

In the areas of housing, employment, education and health, which Doudou Diene describes as the strongest indicators of whether discrimination exists in a country, "the situation of the minorities, and the Indigenous peoples in particular, are clear revelations that they are discriminated against."

Diene, a former diplomat from the West African nation of Senegal, was appointed to the world's most influential position in the fight against racism on Sept. 12, 2002.

Diene is a former deputy representative of Senegal to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), and the former director of inter-cultural projects of UNESCO. He has published many books on problems related to inter-cultural and inter-religious dialogue. Most recently, he edited From Chains to Bonds: The Slave Trade Revisited, a collection of essays dealing with the subject of reparations to the descendants of Africans forced into slavery in the United States.

Diene visited five Canadian cities--Ottawa, Montreal, Halifax, Toronto and Regina--and one First Nation--Piapot in Saskatchewan--during his visit, hearing from government officials and from groups seeking his assistance in getting government attention for their...