Call for unity as anti-racism conference begins

Secretary General Kofi Annan has urged delegates to the UN's summit on racism to set aside their differences, saying the meeting cannot afford to fail.

"If we leave here without agreement we shall give comfort to the worst elements in every society,'' he said as the meeting got underway Friday in Durban.

The meeting has been marred by a dispute over whether Israel is being unfairly singled out.

Arab states have been demanding that the conference text contain a specific reference to what they're calling the racist treatment by Israel of Palestinians in the occupied territories.

That prompted Israel and its allies, including Canada and the United States, to send only low-level contingents in protest.

• FROM AUG. 30, 2001: Manley backs out of UN racism conference

Outside the conference hall, thousands of people chanting anti-Israel and anti-American slogans, waved flags and marched through the streets.

Compromise fizzles

As the meeting began there were signs that a compromise might be in the works.

After a three-hour meeting with Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, U.S. civil rights activist Rev. Jesse Jackson said the Palestinian delegation had agreed to drop its demand for a statement criticizing Israel.

Jackson said Arafat had also agreed to recognize the Holocaust as the 20th century's worst crime.

However Palestinian officials later accused Jackson of being "overzealous." And in a speech to delegates Arafat took a hard line, condemning what he said were Israel's racist practices in dealing with the Palestinians.

He called on delegates to condemn Israel's "colonial, racist plot" against the Palestinians.

Cree report condemns Canada

Also Friday Quebec's Cree released a report at the conference condemning Canada's record on its indigenous people.

The Grand Council handed out 12,000 copies of the 24-page report called 'Pushed to the Edge of Extinction.'

The report looked at the condition of native peoples across the country, including poverty and high suicide rates.

Executive director Bill Namagoose said he hopes the report forces Ottawa to acknowledge what he calls the deplorable living conditions of native people.