When Denmark presented its first National Action Plan Against Racism (NAPAR) in February 2025, the gesture marked an overdue acknowledgment of a problem long documented by human rights monitors. Yet six months later, at the 52nd session of the UN Universal Periodic Review (UPR) Working Group in Geneva, the plan found itself at the centre of a broader interrogation. Forty-four of the eighty-seven participating states raised concerns about racial discrimination, with several explicitly questioning whether the Danish framework matched the scale of the challenge.
The UPR, held on 7 May 2026, functions as the UN’s peer-review mechanism for human rights. Every member state faces scrutiny once every four to five years. Denmark’s fourth-cycle review drew interventions ranging from commendation to sharp criticism, with racism emerging as the dominant theme. The convergence was striking: states from every continent returned to the same set of questions. What definition of racism guides Danish policy? Which communities does the plan protect? And what safeguards exist against the structural mechanisms that perpetuate exclusion?
The Context of the Review
Denmark entered the review with a mixed record. The government had ratified the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance, limited the use of solitary confinement as a disciplinary measure, and adopted the anti-racism action plan itself. These steps earned praise from multiple delegations. Belgium, for instance, welcomed the NAPAR alongside the 2024 ratification of ILO Convention 190 and the introduction of a consent-based definition of rape. Norway noted the criminalisation of torture. Finland highlighted the 2025 political agreement on compensation for Greenlandic women subjected to forced contraception campaigns between 1960 and 1990.
Yet the same states that acknowledged progress pressed for more. Belgium immediately followed its commendation with three recommendations: effective investigation and prosecution of racist hate crimes, a comprehensive disaggregated data-collection system, and continued dialogue with affected communities. The pattern repeated across Western European interventions. Praise for Danish institutions gave way to specific demands for structural reform.
The NAPAR itself became a focal point. Thirty-two states referenced the plan, not all favourably. Several noted its adoption date (February 2025) as a positive step while questioning its scope, its definitions, and its omissions. The critique coalesced around five areas: the absence of Muslims as an explicit target group, the lack of standardised hate-crime data, the persistence of racial and religious profiling, the continuation of the so-called “parallel society” housing framework, and the absence of independent monitoring mechanisms.
Western European and Allied Perspectives
The interventions from Denmark’s nearest neighbours carried particular weight. France, in a concise statement delivered in French, recommended revising legislative provisions that introduce ethnicity-based criteria into public policies, particularly in housing and education. It called for a comprehensive and coherent anti-discrimination law. Luxembourg went further, demanding an explicit prohibition of racial or religious profiling, effective reporting mechanisms, and the acceleration of reforms to reduce pre-trial detention and prolonged isolation regimes.
Ireland’s intervention combined welcome for LGBTIQ+ protections with a direct call to update the national action plan against racism to include a definition of racial discrimination. It also recommended the establishment of a permanent, independent National Rapporteur to monitor anti-trafficking activities, a proposal that echoed broader demands for oversight structures.
Canada’s statement proved among the most pointed. It noted the 2025 ruling of the Court of Justice of the European Union on Denmark’s “parallel housing” framework and encouraged adherence. It recommended requiring police to register incidents as potential hate crimes when victims indicate bias motivation, ensuring third-country asylum initiatives comply with international obligations, and implementing trauma-informed mental health services for Indigenous communities in Greenland consistent with the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
Australia matched this directness. It welcomed the Prime Minister’s apology to Greenland’s Inuit victims of forced contraception but immediately called for the repeal of provisions in Regulation L38 and the Act on Policing that designate so-called “parallel societies” and permit ethnicity-based discrimination in social housing and law enforcement. It also demanded increased protections for victim-survivors of gender-based violence during investigations.
Germany raised concerns about return centres for migrants, particularly their impact on residents’ mental well-being, and asked Denmark to review the necessity of housing minors in such facilities. It also posed advance questions about structural cooperation between the Danish government and the self-governing administrations of Greenland and the Faroe Islands regarding human rights protection.
The Netherlands and New Zealand added their voices to the scrutiny of structural frameworks. The Netherlands recommended establishing national guidelines for persons with variations in sex characteristics, while New Zealand called for the full application of the Istanbul Convention across the entire Kingdom, including Greenland and the Faroe Islands. Finland focused on algorithmic discrimination, urging Denmark to ensure that artificial intelligence and algorithms in welfare services do not discriminate against marginalised groups, including migrants, persons with disabilities, and ethnic minorities.
These interventions shared a common thread. They treated the NAPAR not as a conclusion but as a starting point, one requiring expansion, clarification, and independent verification.
Beyond the Western Bloc
States from Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the Middle East reinforced the same concerns with varying emphasis. Malaysia recommended reviewing legislation and policies with discriminatory impact on ethnic minorities, establishing clear legal frameworks for law enforcement, and improving data collection on hate speech and hate crimes. Rwanda called for strengthened reporting, investigation, and data systems on racist hate crimes, alongside the adoption of a clear legal definition and explicit prohibition of racial profiling.
Qatar’s intervention proved particularly detailed. It recommended including the international definition of racial discrimination in the national action plan, eliminating barriers to reporting hate crimes, establishing a disaggregated data-collection system, strengthening anti-trafficking measures, and ensuring quality education without discrimination. Tunisia demanded expanding the 2025 action plan to cover all religious and ethnic minorities, condemning extremist anti-Islam discourse, and strengthening the legal and institutional framework against violence against women.
Turkey’s statement adopted a sharper tone. It criticised the absence of Islamophobia from the national action plan despite clear criticism from the European Commission against Racism and Intolerance (ECRI). It demanded a dedicated action plan against Islamophobia without delay, coverage of xenophobia against immigrants and citizens of “non-Western” roots, and guarantees that any changes to expulsion procedures comply with international treaties.
Venezuela echoed this structural critique, calling for the review of discriminatory elements in the Parallel Society Act and the development of a comprehensive plan against violence towards women and girls with disaggregated data. China expressed concern about the “ghetto law” based on race and the need to eliminate the negative impacts of colonialism on Indigenous peoples.
Bangladesh, Iran, and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea all raised the “non-Western” classification as a source of discrimination. Iran called for an end to Islamophobic rhetoric and the adoption of a comprehensive national strategy. The DPRK demanded the abolition of discriminatory frameworks, including “non-Western” classifications. These states, often critical of Western human rights records, found common ground with European neighbours on the specific mechanisms of Danish policy.
The Convergence on Data and Definitions
One demand recurred with unusual frequency: the call for standardised, disaggregated data. Belgium, Qatar, Rwanda, Ireland, Malaysia, Nigeria, Norway, and Poland all pressed Denmark to improve its collection and publication of hate-crime statistics broken down by ethnicity, religion, gender, and other criteria. The absence of such data, noted in multiple interventions, hinders the ability to measure scope, identify trends, and evaluate policy effectiveness.
The definition of racism itself became contested terrain. Ireland, Qatar, Malta, and several others noted that the NAPAR lacks a clear definition of racial discrimination. Burkina Faso recommended enriching the plan with specific, measurable objectives and indicators. Norway called for expanding it with measurable goals. Costa Rica urged ensuring the plan covers all historically discriminated groups and minorities.
These demands align with a broader international consensus. The UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) has repeatedly called for disaggregated data collection. The European Commission against Racism and Intolerance (ECRI) has urged Denmark to address anti-Muslim discrimination and to establish unified hate-crime recording systems. The convergence of state recommendations with these treaty-body positions suggests not isolated criticism but a shared diagnostic.
Civil Society Echoes
The UPR process incorporates submissions from non-governmental organisations alongside state reports. For Denmark’s fourth cycle, several NGOs submitted analyses of the NAPAR. Among them, a joint submission by CAP Liberté de Conscience, the European Muslim Initiative for Social Cohesion (EMISCO), and Youth for Human Rights Denmark examined the plan’s gaps. The submission, authored by Bashy Quraishy and Gregory Christensen, both members of the Advisory Board of the Danish Institute for Human Rights, identified the omission of Muslims as an explicit target group, the absence of standardised hate-crime data frameworks, the lack of prohibitions on racial and religious profiling, the persistence of stigmatising urban policies, and the need for independent monitoring and civil-society partnership.
These themes found resonance in the chamber. States did not cite the submission directly; diplomatic practice rarely permits such attribution. Yet the overlap between NGO analysis and state recommendations proved notable. The call for a definition of racial discrimination in the NAPAR, the demand to address anti-Muslim racism, the insistence on data transparency, and the critique of the “parallel society” framework all appeared in both the civil society documentation and the official interventions.
The Danish Institute for Human Rights, the national human rights institution, reinforced this convergence in its own stakeholder report. It recommended expanding the action plan against racism with specific, measurable goals and indicators, making monitoring initiatives permanent, and extending the plan to address discrimination and hatred against all religious and ethnic minorities, including Muslims. The Institute’s position, grounded in its statutory mandate and Paris Principles accreditation, lent institutional weight to concerns raised by both states and civil society.
What Happens Next
The UPR generates recommendations that the reviewed state may accept, note, or reject. Denmark now faces a catalogue of proposals spanning racial discrimination, gender-based violence, migrant rights, detention conditions, Indigenous rights in Greenland and the Faroe Islands, and the governance of emerging technologies. The acceptance phase typically concludes within six months of the review session.
For the NAPAR specifically, the relevant recommendations cluster around five demands: include a definition of racial discrimination aligned with the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination; expand the plan to cover all religious and ethnic minorities, including Muslims; establish standardised, disaggregated hate-crime data collection; prohibit racial and religious profiling; and review the “parallel society” housing framework. Additional demands address independent monitoring, civil-society funding, and the extension of anti-racism measures to Greenland and the Faroe Islands.
The implementation phase then stretches over the four-and-a-half years until the next review cycle. States that accepted recommendations must report on progress. The UPR thus functions not as a tribunal but as a mechanism of sustained pressure, where repeated recommendations across multiple cycles can gradually shift policy.
For civil society organisations, the period following the review offers a strategic window. NGOs can monitor which recommendations Denmark accepts, track implementation through shadow reporting, and use the documented international consensus to leverage domestic policy change. The convergence of Western and non-Western states on specific structural reforms, from data collection to profiling prohibitions, creates a broad coalition of concern that transcends the usual geopolitical divides.
The Danish case illustrates both the potential and the limitations of the UPR. The mechanism succeeded in placing structural racism on the international agenda for a state with otherwise strong human rights credentials. It generated specific, measurable demands rather than vague exhortations. Yet the test lies not in Geneva but in Copenhagen, in the ministries that must now decide whether to expand the NAPAR’s scope, revise its definitions, and subject its implementation to independent scrutiny.
The states have spoken. The question now is whether Denmark will listen.
