Jewish people and roles of media and civil society

Osce

Rome/Bratislava [ENA] On 5th February a major conference will be opened by OSCE Chairperson-in-Office and Slovakia’s Foreign Minister, Miroslav Lajčák, in Bratislava . The theme of the conference will focus on strengthening the security of Jewish people and communities, and how education and Holocaust remembrance, media and social media, and civil society can play an important role in combating anti-Semitism .

The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe works for stability, prosperity and democracy in 57 states through political dialogue about shared values and through practical work that makes a true difference. The conference is the first to be organized by Slovakia’s 2019 OSCE Chairmanship and will bring together government representatives, political leaders, as well as stakeholders from academia, civil society and the media to discuss various and complementary approaches to addressing anti-Semitism. The participants will review the relevance of these approaches to the domestic contexts of OSCE participating States, and their applicability to strategies promoting tolerance and non-discrimination.

The conference is organized with the support of the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR). Alongside the OSCE Chairperson-in-Office, Minister Miroslav Lajčák the conference will open with remarks by: Ingibjörg Sólrún Gísladóttir, ODIHR Director; Benjamin L. Cardin, United States Senator and OSCE Parliamentary Assembly Special Representative on Anti-Semitism, Racism and Intolerance; Ronald S. Lauder, President of the World Jewish Congress; Igor Rintel, President of the Central Union of Jewish Religious Communities in Slovakia; and Rabbi Andrew Baker, Personal Representative of the Chairperson-in-Office on Combating Anti-Semitism.

Media representatives are invited to cover the conference’s six opening speakers starting at 15:00 on Tuesday, 5 February 2019 at the Grand Hotel River Park, Dvořákovo nábrežie 6, Bratislava. Media representatives wishing to attend must complete the registration form by 1 February, available at: https://www.cognitoforms.com/ODIHR1/CiOConferenceOnAntiSemitism2019 For further details, please contact: Zuzana Koštáliková, at Slovakia’s Ministry of Foreign and European Affair,s at +421 2 59 78 3694 (telephone), +421 918 660 137 (mobile) or zuzana.kostalikova@mzv.sk or Samuel Pavlíček, of Slovakia’s Vienna-based OSCE Chairmanship team, at +43 1 368 94 33 349 (telephone), +43 660 789 7544 (mobile) or samuel.pavlicek@mzv.sk