News

Can Europe maintain hope of a free, open society? Nous sommes Charlie!

Prague, 8.1.2015 19:08, (ROMEA) The aim of the Islamist terrorists who committed murder yesterday in Paris is clear: This is their attempt to contribute toward the introduction of a regime that will decide what we can laugh at, what we must believe, how we are to behave, how we are to dress... and what we are to hate. Such a regime is based on contempt for minorities, on fear, inequality, and punishment.  full story

"Je suis Charlie" and "I like moderate Muslims"

Paris, 8.1.2015 18:19, (ROMEA) Some in France have responded to yesterday's mass murder in Paris by carring signs reading "Je suis Charlie" and "I like moderate Muslims". Islamist terrorists broke into the editorial offices of the satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo, shooting 12 people dead and wounding others yesterday.  full story

Czech cities honor French shooting victims, freedom of speech

Prague, 8.1.2015 17:25, (ROMEA) Today in front of the French Embassy, people in Prague will be able to express their solidarity with the victims of Wednesday's shooting at the Paris offices of the satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo, during which 12 people perished. The embassy has announced that the French community in the Czech Republic is convening the assembly.  full story

Miroslav Kováč: Let's be better parents in 2015

Prague, 8.1.2015 0:26, (ROMEA) The year 2014 was, from my perspective, a test for the "maturity" of Romani people in the Czech Republic, their ability to adapt to today's conditions and take advantage of the options offered by democracy to improve their position. A quarter of a century is enough time for us to start drawing on those experiences.  full story

Czech Police charge five with support for suppression of human rights over 1 May 2014 march

Ústí nad Labem, 7.1.2015 22:34, (ROMEA) Police have charged five persons who participated in last year's 1 May march in Ústí nad Labem with showing sympathy for a movement to suppress human rights and freedoms. The people were wearing banned symbols.  full story

Czech publicity about family of Romani quintuplets crosses the line

Prague, 7.1.2015 21:53, (ROMEA) Klára Vítková-Rulíková has become a celebrity. She became one by supporting the first quintuplets ever born in the Czech Republic and their family.  full story

Czech news server Protiproud claims that all Romani children are retarded

Prague, 7.1.2015 20:09, (ROMEA) The year 2015 has begun in the Czech Republic in one of the worst possible ways: With an hysterical, xenophobic campaign against Muslims and Romani people. Czech MP Tomio Okamura unleashed the hateful whirlwind of opinions with his "war on kebabs" and other quasi-fascist opinions have begun swarming like wasps.  full story

Commentary: Does Okamura have a future?

Prague, 6.1.2015 21:27, (ROMEA) There would be no point in returning to the hateful and stupid remarks by Tomio Okamura about Muslims and no point in covering them at all if a basic question were not hanging in the air: Does this indicate the future of our public discourse and politics? Unfortunately, such a future cannot be ruled out.  full story

Czech MP calls for harassment of Muslims

Prague, 6.1.2015 20:30, (ROMEA) Czech MP Tomio Okamura, the head of the "Dawn of Direct Democracy" (Úsvit) movement, has used online social networking to urge the public to harass Muslims in the country - for example, by "taking pigs for walks to relieve themselves" near mosques. Okamura told news server iDNES.cz that his call was not an incitement to intolerance and claimed to have consulted the text with lawyers before posting it.  full story

Czech media outlet reprints old, misleading information about Roma in UK

Prague, 6.1.2015 19:38, (ROMEA) News server Novinky.cz has published an article with the headline "French town doesn't want to bury Romani child who didn't pay taxes" that includes information more than a year old about the situation in the suburb of Sheffield in England. As in its previous reporting, the news server's current reporting is silent as to the results of a police investigation into the matter, which means and the information it has now (re)published is extremely misleading.  full story

France: Immigrant Romani infant buried near Paris after being refused burial elsewhere

Wissous, France, 6.1.2015 0:07, (ROMEA) In the community of Wissous near Paris a Romani infant was buried Monday during a ceremony attended by hundreds of people. The nearby small town of Champlan had previously refused her burial in their cemetery.  full story

Czech SocDems get new leadership in region to address local coalition with extremists

Teplice, 5.1.2015 21:27, (ROMEA) The new chair of the Czech Social Democratic Party (ČSSD) in the Ústí Region is the Vice-Mayor of Štětí (Litoměřice district), Miroslav Andrt. He is replacing Radek Scherfer of Chomutov, who led the party in the region for the last two years.  full story

Slovak media depict Roma stereotypically and often anonymously

Bratislava, Slovakia, 3.1.2015 1:14, (ROMEA) They are dependent on state aid, impoverished, and uneducated, they commit crime more often than members of the majority part of society, and they have many children. That is what Romani people in Slovakia often look like through the eyes of the majority, and several media outlets are contributing to this stereotypical image  full story

Former Czech Foreign Minister does not believe his father was involved with the Lety camp

Prague, 2.1.2015 23:50, (ROMEA) Former Czech Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg does not believe his father was involved at all in the establishment of the WWII-era camp at Lety by Písek. Radio Wave reports that he made the statement in response to claims by Paul Polansky that Schwarzenberg's father needed a cheap labor force in 1939 to clean up after a large blizzard and asked authorities to build a labor camp for that purpose.  full story

2015 issues for Romea.cz: "Practical schools" and social housing

Prague, 2.1.2015 22:55, (ROMEA) The new year in the Czech Republic has begun with the ongoing design of the social housing law and a controversial amendment to welfare policy that will have hard-to-predict consequences. The amendment is intended to restrict "trafficking in poverty" by residential hotels, but it is not clear whether thought has been given to where those now living in such facilities might eventually end up as a result of the changes.  full story

Roma wanted: Apply for unique cultural management training – Khamoro Shares its Experience

Prague, 2.1.2015 20:37, (ROMEA) The NGO Slovo 21, based in the Czech Republic, has issued the following press release:
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Czech media analysis: News about Roma makes money, but reporting is not objective

Prague, 2.1.2015 19:48, (ROMEA) As part of a project called "Reducing discrimination and racism by altering the media depiction of Romani people", supported by a grant from Iceland, Lichtenstein and Norway through the EEA Grants, the ROMEA organization has published an introductory analysis of the depiction of Romani people in the Czech media in recent years. The aim of the project is to prevent society from shifting towards extremism and a radicalization of its relationship toward Romani people by doing our best to influence and eventually also modify how the media reports about Romani people.  full story

Czech Police shelve case of death threats against Roma

Děčín, 30.12.2014 21:41, (ROMEA) Drahomír Radek Horváth, a Romani social services staffer for a human rights organization, was in a Děčín restaurant with friends at the end of November when they became the target of vulgar racist abuse and death threats. Horváth did not allow himself to be provoked and reported the entire incident to police.  full story

Parallel worlds: The life of Romani people in Norway

Prague, 29.12.2014 21:59, (ROMEA) "There probably does not exist any other group against which Norwegians harbor more prejudice," says Balder Hasvoll, the Romani Minority Adviser to the Norwegian capital of Oslo. News server Romea.cz is interviewing him in Czech, as he has both studied and worked in the Czech Republic.  full story

Netherlands: Wilders to be prosecuted for anti-Moroccan remarks

The Hague, 29.12.2014 20:12, (ROMEA) Wire services have reported that the Dutch Public Prosecutor's Office has decided to prosecute Geert Wilders, an anti-Muslim MP, for inciting hatred through remarks he made about Moroccan immigrants. The head of the ultra-right Party for Freedom (PVV), which is seated in Parliament and leads in local public opinion polls, will be charged for racially insulting a group and inciting discrimination and hatred, according to a statement from the prosecutor.  full story