Oprah snub shames Swiss, highlights EU race issues

When talk-show host Oprah Winfrey was turned away from a Hermes boutique in Paris in 2005, she didn't think it would happen again. But when a shop assistant in Zurich, Switzerland, refused to show her a $38,000 crocodile handbag because she thought Winfrey wouldn't be able to afford it, the veteran talk show host decided to speak up.

In an interview with Larry King this week, Winfrey accused the assistant of racially profiling her, sparking a heated debate about racism and immigration in Switzerland, a country that earlier this week moved to deny asylum-seekers unfettered entry to public venues like swimming pools and churches in the northern town of Bremgarten.

"She said: 'No, no, no, you don’t want to see that one. You want to see this one. Because that one will cost too much; you will not be able to afford that,'" Winfrey quoted the clerk in an interview on "Entertainment Tonight."

"And I said, 'Well, I did really want to see that one.' And she refused to get it."

The owner of the luxury goods shop Trois Pommes denied the celebrity's accusations Friday, but Daniela Bar, spokesperson for the Swiss tourism office, apologized to Winfrey Thursday after both incidents unleashed a storm of criticism in Switzerland. 

Advocacy group Human Rights Watch (HRW) fiercely disapproved of the country's latest measure that restricts the movement of asylum-seekers. 

"For Switzerland, the home of the United Nations refugee agency, to introduce a blatantly discriminatory policy that effectively segregates asylum seekers from the communities in which they live is shocking," Gerry Simpson, senior refugee researcher for HRW, said in a statement.

More than 20 refugees, including two children, moved into the newly opened center with a capacity of 150 people in Bremgarten Monday. Mario Gattiker, head of the Swiss Office for Migration, told Swiss media that the measure is designed to prevent "50 asylum seekers visiting a football pitch or swimming pool all at once," as well as "to accommodate public concern." 

Al Jazeera and wire services

Simpson told Al Jazeera that the measure "hasn't completely come out of the blue," and pointed at the Swiss nationalist People's Party's focus on promoting intolerance towards foreigners.

"The People's Party's role in these issues is concerning and speak to some of the broader concerns about racism and xenophobia at least of some part of the political spectrum in Switzerland," he said.

In 2009, Swiss voters held a referendum in support of a constitutional amendment to ban the construction of minarets, stigmatizing Muslim minorities and worrying regional human-rights watchdog the European Commission against Racism and Intolerance (ECRI), which expressed concern that "an initiative that infringes human rights can be put to vote."

People's Party campaign posters that made Muslim women wearing burkas look like missiles launching off a Swiss flag were part of the campaign against the amendment, Simpson said.

In June, Swiss voters approved quotas to limit the growing number of immigrants entering the country, mostly from poorer European countries with high unemployment rates -- a reflection of the mounting concerns about high housing prices and expensive schools in a country where nearly a quarter of the population holds a foreign passport.

In 2009, ECRI issued a series of recommendations to Swiss authorities, urging them to provide training to lawmakers and police forces on how to prevent racist acts. It also asked that special attention be paid to measures promoting integration and tolerance toward foreigners. In 2012, the commission concluded that its recommendations had not been fully implemented.

Switzerland's assessment is part of a recent series of negative evaluations the ECRI issued to other European countries, such as Portugal and Finland, where a general absence of laws to fight discrimination worries policymakers.

In March, Viviane Reding, the European Commissioner for Justice, Fundamental Rights and Citizenship, drew attention to the issue of racism and xenophobia in Europe, citing a report by the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights that found that discrimination and intolerance are "a daily reality" in Europe.

Last year, more than 45 million people were listed as refugees or "internally displaced persons" -- those who are forced to flee their homes but do not cross an international border -- across the world, the highest number since 1994.