Asians suffer discrimination

New Zealand

Asians are regarded as the group most likely to suffer discrimination in New Zealand, according to survey results.

In the poll conducted for the Human Rights Commission by UMR Survey, 74% of respondents said Asian people experienced "a great deal" or "some" discrimination.

Men and children were groups with the lowest level of perceived discrimination at 27%.

The figures are contained in the Race Relations Report's discrimination chapter, which will be released to the national meeting of the Federation of Ethnic Councils in Auckland on Saturday.

The report, the full version of which will be published next month, also records media reports of racially motivated crime last year.

Among them was the jailing of Hayden Brent McKenzie, 31, for a life term for the killing of Korean backpacker Jae Hyeon Kim near Westport in 2003.

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The report said racial discrimination and harassment complaints to the Human Rights Commission in 2008 totalled 407, a slight drop on the 414 in the previous year.

Of the complaints, the largest number related to employment. The next most common were provision of goods and services and racial harassment.

Race Relations Commissioner Joris de Bres says the only information about the extent of racially motivated crime was reports in the media. He says police did not collect data about complaints, prosecutions or convictions for such crimes.

The United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination has called for such data to be collected by police in New Zealand.

De Bres says continued individual and community action is needed to address racial discrimination and harassment.