News

Ireland: Roma immigrant challenges state's refusal to award her welfare

22.7.2015 0:35 The Irish Times reports that a Roma citizen of Romania with two young children is suing Ireland's Department of Social Protection for refusing to award her various welfare benefits, claiming the refusal is a violation of EU law. Her counsel, Derek Shorthall, told the High Court that the case raises "very weighty legal issues".  full story

Czech Gov't plans program to demolish condemned ghetto buildings without EU strings

21.7.2015 23:41 The Czech Regional Development Ministry is designing a program to aid municipalities with demolishing ruined buildings. "The demolition of these buildings is a partial contribution to addressing the situation in socially excluded localities," Czech Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka (Czech Social Democratic Party) said today during a visit to Ústí nad Labem.  full story

Germany: Hundreds of Roma protest their deportation

21.7.2015 22:46 According to a press release from the alle-bleiben.info organization, on Saturday, 18 July, 600 people assembled in Hamburg, Germany to protest the deportation of Roma refugees back to their home countries. Demonstrators demanded an end to the deportations of all Roma, the right to remain in Germany, interpreters who speak Romanes to be provided during official interactions, unrestricted work permits for detainees, earlier opportunities to move out of detention centers, and that officials pay attention to refugees' medical reports.  full story

Czech Republic: Romani children in a small town discuss the "special school"

21.7.2015 20:00 The Czech town of Kostelec nad Orlicí has a population of 6 000 and a diverse composition in terms of nationalities. A refugee camp is located there and a large Romani community lives there as well.  full story

Commentary: Football still trumps immigration demonstrations for the Czech public

21.7.2015 1:12 On Saturday in Prague we saw demonstrations against receiving refugees and in favor of receiving them. These events struck me as bizarre and a bit tragicomic.
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EU interior ministers offer 8 000 fewer places than needed for refugee redistribution

20.7.2015 23:32 EU-28 interior ministers did not manage to fully agree today on the redistribution of 40 000 asylum seekers currently located in Greece and Italy. Czech Interior Minister Milan Chovanec said the EU-28 states have offered to redistribute only 32 000 people during the next two years.  full story

Hungary: Demonstration against fence on Serbian border says "Jesus was a refugee too"

20.7.2015 19:57 Reuters reports that approximately 1 000 people demonstrated on 14 July in the center of Budapest against the construction of a fence on the border with Serbia that is supposed to prevent immigrants from entering Hungary. The declaration of the civic initiatives who organized the demonstration reads as follows: "As far as the construction of the wall goes, the Hungarian Government seems to exceptionally competent. The Government is erecting ever-newer walls between the various layers of society... It is blowing up bridges between politics and society... After so many symbolic walls it has now, at the height of its own cynicism, arrived at an actual wall... There have been enough walls - let's instead build hospitals, houses and schools for Hungarians and immigrants! Asylum seekers are neither angels nor devils but human beings, and as such they have a right to humane treatment and a dignified reception procedure... The money allocated to build this wall is already, at this phase of design planning, the equivalent of the entire budget of the Hungarian state for refugee matters for the last 11 years."  full story

Commentary: Czech Police not living up to their motto

20.7.2015 18:26 Even though I have long had no illusions about how that notorious motto of the Czech Police, "To assist and protect", can sometimes work in practice, during Saturday's demonstrations on Wenceslas Square I could not believe my eyes. Honor is of course due to the officers who kept the enraged, fanatical neo-Nazis away from the people expressing solidarity with refugees that evening (which is, after all, their job), but I would like to discuss my experience with those of their colleagues who did not lift a finger when I directly asked them for assistance.  full story

Palestinian and Romani hiphop artists: "Rap is the CNN of ordinary people"

20.7.2015 2:46 Three weeks ago the "Days of Jerusalem" festival was held in the Czech cities of Prague and Plzeň, an event which for several years has presented the culture of this divided Middle Eastern City. Organizers included an appearance by Palestinian rapper Muhammad Mughrabi on this year's rich program.  full story

Czech Republic: Anti-immigration protesters set EU flags on fire

19.7.2015 21:39 Yesterday right-wing extremists backing organizer Adam B. Bartoš marched on the Office of the Government in Prague after 19:00 chanting "Traitors!". The building was guarded by police and metal barricades as the radicals gave speeches.  full story

Czech Interior Minister: Islamophobic populists using same methods as ultra-right

19.7.2015 4:16 The Czech Interior Ministry anticipates that anti-immigration and populist Islamophobic organizations will increase their activities and that their themes will be more actively taken up by "traditional right-wing extremists". The ministry's predictions are part of its report on the development of extremism during the second quarter of this year.  full story

European Roma Information Office publishes fact sheet on anti-Roma hate speech in European media

19.7.2015 3:29 The European Roma Information Office, a Brussels-based international advocacy organization promoting discussion of Romani issues, has published a fact sheet to raise awareness about hate speech against Romani people in the European media. The fact sheet defines hate speech against Roma as any public conduct that "wilfully expresses intense hostility towards Roma on the basis of their ethnicity".  full story

Czech Police audit says officers proceeded correctly at demonstration with mock-ups of gallows

19.7.2015 2:43 Police officers on duty during the 1 July demonstration against immigration in Prague did not make a mistake when they took no action against demonstrators carrying mock-ups of gallows. Yesterday Czech Police spokesperson Tomáš Hulan confirmed to the Czech News Agency that an investigation by the Regional Police Internal Affairs Department has absolved the officers.  full story

Council of Europe Human Rights Commissioner: Romani migrants' rights are being violated

18.7.2015 23:00 Nils Muiznieks, Commissioner for Human Rights of the Council of Europe, published a commentary on 16 July calling for myths about Romani migration in Europe to be debunked. In the commentary, Muiznieks asserts that media in Germany, Italy, Switzerland and the UK have "often put forward unfounded figures about actual or potential arrivals of Roma."  full story

Czech Republic: Only minor incidents at today's competing protests over immigration

18.7.2015 22:16 In the center of Prague on Wenceslas Square today there were different events organized by those opposed to immigration and by those expressing solidarity with refugees. The most dramatic situation occurred at around 19:00 at the bottom of the Square.  full story

Czech Human Rights Minister: We do not want the fascisization of society

18.7.2015 21:06 Today in Prague two demonstrations are underway by those opposed to receiving refugees in the Czech Republic. At 15:00 an assembly began at the statue of St. Václav and at 17:00 a "People's Camp" of right-wing extremists began demanding the immediate closure of the borders and the withdrawal of the Czech Republic from the EU.  full story

European Court of Justice finds Czech utility discriminates against Roma in Bulgaria

18.7.2015 19:32 Deutsche Presse-Agentur reports that yesterday the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg ruled that the decision by the Bulgarian division of the Czech power company ČEZ to install electricity meters in the predominantly Romani-occupied quarter of the town of Dupnica at a greater height than in other parts of town constitutes discrimination. ČEZ spokesperson Barbora Půlpánová, however, told the Czech News Agency that the meters were installed prior to ČEZ entering the Bulgarian market.  full story

Czech Republic: NGO starts risky recording studio on edge of Romani ghetto

18.7.2015 18:00 On the border between Brno's Romani ghetto and the "normal" city center, a recording studio full of energy and symbolism is slated to begin growing on the premises of a former gaming room. "There are other ways to play" is one of the slogans accompanying the studio's vision.  full story

Czech capital won't allow second demonstration against xenophobia because of timing clash with anti-immigrant event

16.7.2015 23:24 The City of Prague has refused permission to a second assembly in support of receiving refugees announced for this Saturday on Wenceslas Square. The space requested had previously been reserved.  full story

Commentary: A hijacked ceremony and the moral power of the Mothers of Srebrenica

16.7.2015 19:24 When Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vučić set out last Saturday for the ceremony commemorating the 20th anniversary of the genocide near the eastern Bosnian town of Srebrenica, he probably did not expect to be received with applause, but he probably did not suspect he would have to quickly leave the memorial to the victims at the former UN base in Srebrenica-Potočari in a stampede under a hail of curses, plastic bottles and rocks. On a day that was supposed to honor the memory of the more than 8 000 ethnic Muslims massacred by Bosnian Serbian military units in July 1995 near Srebrenic the victims instead became yet again a target of hypocritical political games at truth and reconciliation.  full story