Germany’s Seehofer touts expert panel on Islamophobia after Hanau killings An expert group to tackle Islamophobia in Germany has been floated by Chancellor Angela Merkel's interior minister. The move follows a racist multiple shooting last week and precedes an integration summit in Berlin.

February 29, 2020   

(Deutsche Welle) Interior Minister Horst Seehofer announced on Saturday the creation of an “independent expert group on Islamophobia” (Muslimfeindlichkeit), saying it would emulate current ministerial panels on anti-Semitism and antiziganism, meaning hostility toward Jewish and Roma communities respectively.

His call follows a charge on Thursday by a federal migrant network that Germany exercises “massive structural discrimination” and “structural racism” towards 19 million of its residents, or 23% of the population, who are statistically seen as having “migrant backgrounds” but who have long been at home in the republic.

The Interior Ministry said the new panel would convene for years and make recommendations on how to tackle anti-Muslim hatred and the marginalization of Muslims amid persistent far-right intimidation.

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