Swastika ban left out of EU's racism law

GERMANY will not push during its presidency of the European Union for an EU-wide ban on the swastika and will leave it up to member states to decide whether to punish people who deny that the Holocaust happened, Berlin said yesterday.

Germany had said it wanted to harmonise rules throughout the 27-member bloc for dealing with Holocaust deniers and for punishing displays of the Nazi symbol, banned in Germany and several other states.