WHILE addressing the European Parliament, the UN Secretary-General, Mr Ban Ki-moon, has warned Europe against a new “politics of polarization,” discrimination and intolerance over immigration, with Muslim immigrants as primary targets.

“Almost seven years ago, my predecessor Kofi Annan stood before you,” he told the 27-nation European Parliament in Strasbourg, France. “In his address, he made an impassioned call for Europe to seize the opportunities presented by immigration and to resist those who demonized these newcomers as ‘the other.’ I wish I could report, today, that the situation in Europe has improved over the intervening years. But as a friend of Europe, I share profound concern.”

In a speech two hours earlier to the 47-nation Council of Europe, whose 800 million citizens number some 300 million more than those represented in the European Union’s parliament, he highlighted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights’ proclamation of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family.

“That is our base line,” he declared at the session marking the 60th anniversary of the European Convention on Human Rights. “That is our standard. There are no exceptions. In a complicated and connected world, this mission is essentially simple and simply essential.”

In his address to the parliamentarians, Mr. Ban said Europe has served “as an extraordinary engine of integration, weaving together nations and cultures into a whole that is far, far greater than the sum of its parts. But for Europe, ‘winning the peace’ was the narrative of the last century.

“The 21st century European challenge is tolerance within. Inclusion, building diverse communities, is as complex a task as the one Europe faced after the Second World War. None of this is easy,” he added.

Migrants, he noted, suffer disproportionately, whether they are from within Europe or beyond, and he pointed to “a new politics of polarization” as a dangerous emerging trend.