News

Albania: Romani neighborhood demolished for road, residents likely homeless

11.8.2015 1:09 The Roma Virtual Network has published a message from Brisilda Taco, a self-identified Romani activist in Tirana, Albania, about recent home demolitions there. The activist reports that on 23 July, the Albanian Government began to demolish Romani-occupied houses in Selita.  full story

Czech court says asylum seekers must not be detained, Interior Ministry disagrees

7.8.2015 21:40 The Czech Police are not permitted to detain asylum seekers in refugee camps on the basis of suspicion that they might pose a flight risk as stipulated by the European Union's Dublin Regulation. Wednesday's edition of the Czech daily Lidové noviny reported that the Regional Court in Ústí nad Labem has ruled against the practice.  full story

France: Human rights organizations protest forced evictions of Romani people

6.8.2015 23:35 The European Roma Rights Centre and the Ligue des droits de l'Homme (LDH), a French human rights organization, issued the finding last month that up to 4 000 forced evictions of Romani people have taken place in France during the first half of 2015. The organizations say the confiscation of the Romani people's property during these incidents is even worse for them than the displacement is.  full story

Czech paper unleashes hateful racist discussion online, may have committed crime

6.8.2015 20:30 A racist discussion online has been taking place on the Prostějovský večerník ("Prostějov Evening News") news server, and all it took was a few lines of text about a Romani woman who is reportedly receiving "an unbelievable CZK 51 000 a month for four children who aren't even hers from the state!" The online "trailer" for the entire article, which was only fully published in the print version, has been read by almost 100 000 people, several hundred of whom joined an ongoing online discussion beneath it which has been frequently absurd, but predominantly hateful and insulting.  full story

Bulgaria Must Stop Its Anti-Roma Attacks

5.8.2015 0:12 Since May, anti-Roma protests in Bulgaria have led to Roma families being attacked and beaten. Riots escalated after tensions rose between Roma and non-Roma in Garmen, in southwest Bulgaria, and Orlandovzi in Sofia. Dozens have been injured.  full story

Czech Republic: International conference to discuss ethnic data collection options

4.8.2015 23:44 The Office of the Government of the Czech Republic and Open Society Fund Prague are preparing to convene an international conference to review the permissibility of collecting ethnic data and methods for its accumulation and storage. Conference organizers informed members of the Working Group on Roma Education, which advises the Inter-ministerial Commission on Roma Community Affairs, of the project last week.  full story

Europe marks Roma Holocaust Memorial Day from Georgia to Ireland

4.8.2015 22:52 Both official and private commemorations and messages of solidarity were sent across Europe on the occasion of 2 August, not only in the EU-28 countries but in places as far-flung as Georgia. This past April the European Parliament passed a resolution recognizing 2 August as Roma Holocaust Memorial Day.  full story

Commentary: Czech media spread panic about asylum-seeker "uprising", ignore human rights issues

4.8.2015 1:23 Last Thursday evening the Czech news media delivered a dramatic, exciting report claiming that asylum-seekers in a camp in Bělá pod Bezdězem had "rebelled"! Roughly 50 were said to have attempted to escape the facility!  full story

Gallup poll shows Roma isolation from Bulgarian society has intensified over the last 20 years

2.8.2015 20:58 Radio Bulgaria reports that as the Decade of Roma Inclusion comes to a close, Roma are still permanently excluded from Bulgarian society, according to a representative Gallup International poll. Researcher Dimitar Ganev said the poll was conducted in response to inter-ethnic tensions in May and June of this year.  full story

Czech amendment will abolish municipal consent to housing benefits

31.7.2015 2:28 The dramatic, protracted dispute over an amendment which some experts believe could push more than 20 000 people in the Czech Republic "onto the street" has hit another milestone. The Government has tasked Labor and Social Affairs Minister Michaela Marksová with elaborating an amendment to the law on aid to those in material distress that will abolish municipal consent as a condition of the disbursal of housing benefits.  full story

European Roma and Travellers Forum calls for moment of silence, noon, 2 August, International Remembrance Day of the Pharrajimos

31.7.2015 1:46 The European Roma and Travellers Forum is calling for the observation of a moment of silence at noon on Sunday, 2 August, in memory of the Romani victims who were murdered on the night of 2 August and early morning hours of 3 August 1944 in “Zigeunerlager BIII” at Auschwitz – Birkenau. The Roma Holocaust, or Pharrajimos, is considered the biggest tragedy in the history of the Roma in Europe.  full story

Drahomír Radek Horváth: I don't know where to stand on fear of immigrants and Islam

30.7.2015 23:48 I am not a paranoid person and I don't generalize, I judge people by the quality of their character, not their skin color, I tolerate other opinions, religions, sexual orientations, etc. Simply put, as a member of a national minority I have "enjoyed" plenty of generalizations about Roma in my own life.  full story

Council of Europe's Human Rights Commissioner: Time to cure amnesia about the history of Roma in Europe

30.7.2015 20:03 Nils Muižnieks, the Human Rights Commissioner at the Council of Europe, has written in advance of the 2 August commemorations of the 1944 murder of Romani people at Auschwitz that Europe's amnesia about the history of the Roma needs to be cured. Referencing the historical events at Auschwitz in particular, he writes: "Knowledge about both the Roma uprising and the liquidation of the 'Gypsy camp' remains limited in European societies today."  full story

Czech online discussions of refugees are full of hatred

30.7.2015 0:23 Three-quarters of the online contributions posted to Czech-language social networking or other sites that are about refugees are negative. Just one quarter of the 147 000 posts monitored in May and June expressed a desire to aid refugees.  full story

Finland: 15 000 people demonstrate for multiculturalism

29.7.2015 23:18 Agence France-Presse reports that approximately 15 000 people assembled yesterday in the center of the Finnish capital, Helsinki, to express their support for a multicultural society and protest against remarks made by MPs for the governing eurosceptic, populist Party of the Finns. Organizers convened the demonstration to protest remarks made by MP Olli Immonen, who called for "combating the nightmare of multiculturalism" over the weekend on Facebook.  full story

Czech NGO: We either rescue refugees from hell or they will die

29.7.2015 21:01 The Generace 21 (Generation 21) Foundation wants to bring 152 Christian refugees from Iraq to the Czech Republic who have been persecuted by radicals from the self-declared Islamic State organization. Representatives of the foundation gave a list of the refugees' names to the Office of the Government last Thursday and are now waiting for the Government and Interior Ministry to agree to receive them.  full story

Hungary: Ultra-right experiment in Ozd uses systematic oppression to drive Roma out

29.7.2015 3:49 The Associated Press reports that the Hungarian town of Ozd has become a kind of living "laboratory" where the ultra-right Jobbik party is testing the impact of its political decisions at local level. That at least is the warning of Peter Kreko, director of the Political Capital Institute organization, which has long monitored Jobbik's activities.  full story

Czech NGOs criticize public broadcaster's reality TV show of schools for spreading anti-Roma prejudice

28.7.2015 20:45 Eight nonprofit organizations including ROMEA, o.p.s. have sent the Council on Radio and Television Broadcasting (RRTV) an open letter regarding public broadcaster Czech Television's "Class 8A" (Třída 8. A) reality television series. In their view the series, which began last year, contributes to the spread of prejudice and stereotypes about the Romani minority.  full story

Karel Holomek: Polemic with Václav Bělohradský about post-representative society

28.7.2015 1:17 Intra muros, extra muros – inside the "walls of Rome" or outside them: That is how Václav Bělohradský discusses earlier conceptions of society in an article published in the daily Právo entitled "Without nostalgia: On post-representational democracy", and he undoubtedly is right to do so. In the piece, he says he considers multiculturalism to be an "anti-Enlightenment utopia that has been going bankrupt before the eyes of
Europeans" for the last decade.  full story

RomArchive showcases the cultural contributions of Romani people

27.7.2015 23:19 On 26 June, the Advisory Group for RomArchive, the Digital Archive of the Roma, was established. The Archive has now launched operations, according to a press release issued by the Advisory Group.  full story