Following the 1st roundtable held in January, European Commission Coordinator on combating anti-Muslim hatred, David Friggieri, convened a 2nd roundtable to take stock of the past year of activities, to highlight the main Commission actions in the area of racism and xenophobia and to listen to NGOs' ideas and concerns.

The Commission's key initiatives in 2016 were highlighted, namely: i) the Code of Conduct on illegal hate speech agreed with the major IT companies, ii) initiatives taken to support Member States to ensure that hate crime is taken seriously in terms of reporting, recording and training for police and judges iii) funding for projects in the area of racism and xenophobia with a strand of the Rights, Equality and Citizenship Programme dedicated to, specifically, combating anti-Muslim hatred and iv) the establishment of the High-Level Group on racism which was launched in June.

The Coordinator referred to two key Commission initiatives adopted in 2016, namely 1) the Commission's Action Plan on the integration of third country nationals and 2) the Commission's Communication on supporting the prevention of radicalisation leading to violent extremism which frame the Commission's thinking on, respectively, the refugee crisis and the most recent terrorist attacks in Europe which have placed Islamist terrorism in the spotlight.     

The roundtable was an opportunity for the NGOs to exchange views with colleagues from DG Migration and Home Affairs' Terrorism and radicalisation Unit on EU and national security measures and their impact on Muslim communities as well as DG Justice's Non-discrimination and Roma coordination Unit on the state of play of the Equal Treatment Directive and other key initiatives in the area of non-discrimination in the light of worrying levels of discrimination against Muslims in a number of areas of life. Participants also voiced their concern with regard to the increasing prevalence of political speech which stigmatises entire communities.