On 8 September 2020, 15 Arab cities from Egypt (Alexandria, Cairo, Sharm El Sheikh), Iraq (Bagdad), Jordan (Amman), Lebanon (Baalbeck, Byblos, Ras Al Matn, Saida, Tripoli), Mauritania (Nouakchott) and Morocco (Essaouira, Marrakech, Rabat, Tangier), renewed their call for a common front against racism, discrimination, xenophobia and intolerance in the Arab region. Representatives of the cities members of the UNESCO supported Coalition of Arab Cities against Racism, Discrimination, Xenophobia and Intolerance convened in an online consultation organized by the UNESCO Regional Bureau for Science in the Arab States, based in Cairo, to review and update the Coalition’s Ten-Point Plan of Action, originally adopted in June 2008.
Twelve years after the establishment of the Coalition under the auspices of UNESCO, and the issuance of its original Ten-Point Plan of Action, combating racism and discrimination remains a top global priority. Despite the progress achieved, racism has continued to proliferate in many societies globally, with the Arab region being no exception, due to a number of complex factors including high urbanization rates and increased patterns of international migration and displacement. The COVID-19 pandemic, with its social and economic impacts, has further exposed the need to address this deeply rooted phenomenon.
During the opening of the meeting, Dr. Ghaith Fariz, Director of the UNESCO Regional Office in Cairo, along with participating Mayors, voiced their solidarity with Beirut – a member city of the Coalition - expressing their deep sympathy with the people of Lebanon affected by the explosion at Beirut port last August.
Dr. Fariz commended participating Arab cities for their continuous efforts to combat racism and discrimination and achieve urban inclusion, calling on them to be ambitious in revising the plan in alignment with the New Urban Agenda and Sustainable Development Goals 11 and 16 of the Agenda 2030. In their statements, the Mayors of Nouakchott, Mauritania (Coalition co-leading city), Essaouira, Morocco (Coalition co-leading city), Cairo and Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt, and Baalbeck, Lebanon, re-affirmed their commitments to the cause and willingness to strengthen the Ten-Point Plan of Action as a step toward building resilient cities free from discrimination and racism. The Mayors also shared the recent measures they have taken to address the impacts of COVID-19 on their city inhabitants while leaving no one behind, especially in the fields of awareness raising, education, and digitalization of services.
Participating city representatives deliberated each commitment in the Ten-Point Plan of Action through an inclusive process that lead to a consensus on a revised plan and preamble that were subsequently adopted by the Arab cities. Changes in the plan, inter alia, granted special attention to the inclusion of women and children, migrants, minority groups, and persons with disabilities. The revised plan also underlined the importance of encouraging regional and global city-to-city partnerships, and called for the implementation of powerful actions to stop the practice of discrimination and racism through an effective multi-level dialogue and coordination mechanisms among a wide range of stakeholders, with the participation of youth given high prominence. The revised plan of action was announced during the ICCAR Global Steering Committee meeting, which took place within the framework of the World Human Rights Cities Forum in October 2020.