|
No major antisemitic incidents were recorded in Uruguay in 2000. Lawyers representing the Jewish community have begun moves to amend the 1989 anti-discrimination law.
THE JEWISH COMMUNITY
The Jewish community of Uruguay is estimated at about 25,000 out of a general population of 3.2 million. Conversos were among the earliest settlers of the region; however, today most Uruguayan Jews are descendants of twentieth century immigrants of both Sephardi and Ashkenazi origin. The majority of Jews live in the capital Montevideo, with a smaller community in the city of Paysand ú. Jewish families are scattered throughout other parts of the country but not in organized communities.
The Comit é Central Israelita del Uruguay (CCIU), embracing some 60 communities and organizations, functions as a national Jewish representative body. There are a number of well-attended Jewish day schools.
EXTREMIST GROUPS AND ANTISEMITIC ACTIVITIES
The year 2000 witnessed no major antisemitic incidents and no radical Islamic group appeared to have been involved in anti-Jewish activity in Uruguay. Unsigned antisemitic graffiti appeared in various public places, including on the Holocaust memorial in Montevideo, in February 2000.
A 54-year old member of a previously unknown group, Frente Nacional Revolucionario (National Revolutionary Front – FNR), who distributed Nazi literature, drew graffiti on walls and called for a “Fourth Artiguista Reich” (Cuarto Reich Artiguista – after a nineteenth century revolutionary hero), was arrested and sentenced under the anti-discrimination law (see below).
In early December, a bus driver was suspended by his company for insulting a Jewish passenger. A witness had complained to the CCIU which lodged a protest with the bus company.
ATTITUDES TOWARD THE HOLOCAUST AND NAZI ERA
A series of seminars on the Holocaust was held in August–September in Montevideo. Organized by the Nueva Congregaci ón Israelita, together with the Ariel Hebrew-Uruguayan Institute (Instituto Ariel Hebreo-Uruguayo), the sponsors included the Ministry of Education and Culture of the Municipality of Montevideo, the national educational coordinating body CODICEN and various Jewish organizations. Each panel included educators, journalists and leading cultural figures in the country and began with the personal story of a Holocaust survivor living in Uruguay. There was also an essay competition on the subject, “The Ideology of Intolerance: Nazism – Uruguayan Research,” as well as a series of films on the Holocaust.
RESPONSES TO EXTREMISM AND ANTISEMITISM
Lawyers representing CCIU have begun moves to amend the 1989 anti-discrimination law, which is a part of the Penal Code. They claim that the law is difficult to implement in cases of Holocaust denial because the accused claim they are “revisionists.”
Cases such as the FNR member mentioned above resulted in a conviction under the law and a prison term. He was the seventh person to have been sentenced under this law. In several raids, the National Intelligence Directorate had confiscated Nazi literature, photos of the man in Nazi uniform and a video in which he expressed his intention of founding a political party. | 