Features and Commentary

Commentary: My attempted interview with Czech Senator Okamura

Prague, 21.4.2013 17:27, (ROMEA) Recently I read an article by Senator Okamura on his blog about social policy and welfare. While I did not like some of his opinions, I honor and respect freedom of speech.  full story

Commentary: How to produce disinformation in the Czech media

Prague, 8.4.2013 20:48, (ROMEA) "‘When I grow up, I want to be on welfare,’ wish poor children from the Romani ghettos”. So reads the headline of a particular article published on news server iDNES.cz here in the Czech Republic several days ago.  full story

Tamar Ezer: A Signature Is Not Enough

New York, 26.3.2013 10:57, (ROMEA) Violence happens in health care settings. It does not just take place during war or conflict, on the street, or even in our homes among partners. Health care facilities that are supposed to be places of treatment, care, and support are all too often sites for violence. This is particularly true for those who are marginalized in society. The Commission on the Status of Women, the UN’s global policy-making body on equality and advancement of women, significantly recognizes this in its just released “agreed conclusions,” providing guidance on the elimination of all forms of violence against women and girls.  full story

Valeriu Nicolae: How I crashed into the glass-ceiling

Bucharest, 26.3.2013 9:59, (ROMEA) A few months ago I wrote about the problems with funding civil society, and Roma civil society in particular; how EU funds (in particular structural funds) but also project-focused funding stimulate false reporting, rationalizing failures, useless by expensive meetings and trainings, and corruption. Incentives for grassroots work, learning from failures, critical thinking, participation and sharing responsibilities of the vulnerable groups are missing.  full story

Czech ultra-right holds yet another rally full of untruths

Nejdek, 25.3.2013 22:00, (ROMEA) Promoters of the right-wing extremist Workers' Social Justice Party (Dělnická strana sociální spravedlnosti - DSSS) continued their never-ending electoral campaign last Saturday in the Czech town of Nejdek. Police officers were posted to monitor all of the roads and the center of Nejdek was empty. The ultra-right extremists met at the train station, marched from there to the center of town, and held their rally.  full story

Bernard Rorke: What Can the EU Do for Roma in the Face of Rising Populism and Prejudice?

Budapest, 20.3.2013 22:37, (ROMEA) It’s nearly two years since the EU Framework for National Roma Integration Strategies (NRIS) was launched during the Hungarian EU Presidency. Back then, Commissioner Viviane Reding described it as a “huge step forward for millions of Roma around Europe.” When the Commission reviewed the strategies submitted by Member States in May 2012, the rhetoric was more muted. The best the Commission could say was that the strategies amounted to a “first step.” One year on, in a climate of deepening poverty and rising intolerance, there is a grave danger that the prospects of the Framework making a difference to Roma people’s lives will simply dissolve. The newly published policy brief Beyond First Steps provides a concise overview and analysis of developments to date, as well as a clear set of recommendations for the European Commission to keep the Framework on track.  full story

Valeriu Nicolae: The Almighty Church of Social Inclusion

Bucharest, 19.3.2013 11:02, (ROMEA) Over the last ten years I have taken part in about 50 major European Commission conferences on Roma issues. Many were in the early years. I thought initially that conferencing was a way to achieve change. Last year I went to just one EC conference. After the meeting I wrote a piece about structural racism that was published by the European Voice. The “Extraordinary Meeting on Roma” was extraordinary proof of structural problems and ingrained racism within the Commission. Only two speakers out of 29 were Roma.  full story

"I don't want my children to feel like foreigners in their own country"

Czech Republic, 16.3.2013 0:07, (ROMEA) Not quite one year ago, the monthly Romano Voďi devoted an entire issue to the theme of identities in which ethnologist and social anthropologist Zdeněk Uherek reviewed the issue of the plurality of identities in his column "Beneath the Surface" ("Pod povrchem"). The first issue of Romano Voďi this year has returned to the topic of identity construction and the mechanisms through which identity is realized, this time through the lens of the recent Czech presidential election and its reception among members of the Romani minority.  full story

Czech Green Party chair: How far are we from Orbán's Hungary?

Prague, 14.3.2013 16:18, (ROMEA) The Hungarian Parliament has approved a series of changes to the constitution there that threaten, among other things, the independence of the Constitutional Court and weaken minority protections. This is further proof that the European economic and political crisis is starting to contribute to the growth of an extremism and a nationalism that jeopardize democracy.  full story

Commentary: The Romani crisis? A lack of unity!

Postoloprty, Czech Republic, 13.3.2013 22:30, (ROMEA) The Romani people were once a traveling nation. As they passed through different landscapes they encountered the diverse cultures of various nations. In some places they were welcomed for their skills in acrobatics and other arts, their manual dexterity, their musical sensibility, their temperament, and last but not least for their ability to work magic or their knowledge of how to mix herbal concoctions.  full story

Czech town reps attend ghetto meeting, bring few answers

Ústí nad Labem, Předlice, 13.3.2013 15:35, (ROMEA) Yesterday the Konexe association convened a meeting between local Romani residents of the Předlice quarter and representatives of the institutions responsible for ensuring order in the town. The meeting took place at the intersection of Prostřední and Řeháčkova streets.  full story

Commentary: Did Romani activist cause CZK 10 million damage?

Prague, 24.2.2013 20:46, (ROMEA) Ladislav Bílý, the chair of the Romani Civic Association (Romské občanské sdružení) was sentenced this week to six years in prison for subsidy fraud. According to information in the media, he committed the fraud between 2007 and 2010 when he requested subsidies in the name of the association from the municipality of Karlovy Vary, the Karlovy Vary Regional Authority, and the Czech Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs and submitted a falsified confirmation of solvency with his application.  full story

Commentary: NGO war breaks out in Czech Republic

Prague, 15.2.2013 1:25, (ROMEA) "When People in Need, during the worst moment of this crisis at the residential hotel, when there was a risk that people's children would be taken into state care, released a lie to the media claiming that the residential hotel occupants had rejected 20 apartments, they crushed the faith of the people they were collaborating with, as well as the overall faith of the public in NGOs. At the same time, this organization showed that its media image and the provision of an alibi to its allies at the town hall, from which its grant money flows, is more important to it than are human lives and a good resolution to a crisis situation," reads a recent declaration issued by the Housing for All (Bydlení pro všechny) initiative. The abysmal situation of the Romani people in Ústí nad Labem has drawn attention to the deep antagonisms between those whom we have become used to assigning, in a too-simplified way, into apparently clear categories such as "non-governmental organizations" or "activists".  full story

Czech activist: Nothing about Roma without them

Ústí nad Labem, 12.2.2013 17:38, (ROMEA) The Ústí edition of the deník.cz news server has published an interview with Miroslav Brož of the Konexe civic association in the Czech Republic in which he discusses residential hotels, Romani people, and the mistakes of the social welfare system (in Czech at http://ustecky.denik.cz/zpravy_region/broz-projekty-pro-romy-selhavaji-20130208.html). News server Romea.cz publishes the interview in full translation below.  full story

Jarmila Balážová: I will vote for Karel Schwarzenberg

Prague, 24.1.2013 17:14, (ROMEA) It has been interesting to see what the first direct presidential election in the Czech Republic has unleashed and shown us. Even though some of this all could have been predicted, I really did not expect some of the responses I have seen, just as I did not expect certain people active in cultural and public life to back the candidates they are now backing.  full story

Analysis: Kristallnacht and its connection to Europe today

Prague, 9.11.2012 20:03, (ROMEA) During the late night hours of 9 November and the early morning hours of 10 November 1938, the Nazis in occupied Austria, the occupied border region of the Czech lands, and Germany murdered Jewish people and captured them for the concentration camps. A total of 267 synagogues were burned down or otherwise demolished, 7 500 Jewish apartments and shops were ransacked, 91 Jewish people were directly murdered during the pogrom, and 30 000 ended up in death camps.  full story