Media monitoring

Media image of Romani people in Slovakia: Generalizations and stereotypes

13.1.2016 23:06 The civic association Romano kher - Rómsky dom (Roma House) has produced an analysis of selected Slovak media outlets in collaboration with the Media Academy, focusing on those outlets that significantly contribute to creating the image of various minorities for the Slovak public. The survey monitored the period from the beginning of June to the end of October 2015.  full story

Czech media outlet publishes interview with detained migrant

23.8.2015 20:21 Online news server Aktuálně.cz published an interview on 18 August with a Pakistani citizen who spent half a year en route to Germany only to be intercepted by the Aliens Police in the Czech Republic and detained in the Bělá-Jezová camp there. "I don't understand why the Czech Republic is holding us here. I do not want to remain here. I have never committed a crime. During my six months fleeing Pakistan I traveled through many countries, but only in the Czech Republic was I imprisoned. After I am released I want to go to Germany... I am not seeking asylum in the Czech Republic. Moreover, I am afraid that I will not be treated well in this prison," the migrant says in the interview.  full story

Romea.cz editor says Czech policy toward Roma full of chaos, poor concepts and populism

14.8.2015 2:10 Michal Komárek, the editor of news server Romea.cz, discussed the degree to which the Czech Republic is managing to solve its "Romani problem" during a radio program on the ČRo Plus station yesterday. The discussion was occasioned by the current session of the UN Committee for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination reviewing the situation in the Czech Republic.  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

Yet another Czech tabloid news server perpetrates a racist hoax

26.7.2015 20:53 On 16 July the European Court of Justice (ECJ) announced a significant finding in the area of racial discrimination. The court did not pronounce judgment on anyone, but merely expressed a legal opinion which an EU Member State court should now follow.  full story

Czech media outlet puts unnecessary emphasis on ethnicity in reporting public transport incident

26.4.2015 3:30 On Thursday 23 April, online news server iDNES.cz wrote about an incident that took place on 22 April on public transport in Jihlava using the headline "Gypsies fight on trolleybus". After the obcasnik.eu website drew attention to this interesting headline, the iDNES.cz editors quietly and rapidly erased the content.  full story

Romea.cz: Media watchdogs are not censors - here's the proof!

Prague, 3.2.2015 20:01, (ROMEA) One of news server Romea.cz's activities is monitoring the media, fact-checking the correctness and veracity of the information journalists use, and then attempting to get misleading, tendentious or untrue information corrected. We play this watchdog role not only with respect to the media, but also with respect to municipal or state officials and politicians, etc.  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

Bothered by how the media report on Romani people? ROMEA wants to hear from you

Prague, 29.12.2014 5:41, (ROMEA) "One of the main roles in society's shift toward extremism and radicalization in relation to Romani people is played by the media," says Zdeněk Ryšavý, director of ROMEA, o.p.s. "Ever more frequently, in media of all kinds, we are encountering journalists who report about Romani people superficially, without any knowledge, or without sufficient reflection on the context of a story."  full story

Czech ultra-right leader rails against Arab spa clients

Teplice, 29.9.2014 22:15, (ROMEA) Several people were arrested by police on Saturday during an assembly convened in the town of Teplice by the Workers' Social Justice Party (Dělnická strana sociální spravedlnosti - DSSS). Police spokesperson Dan Vítek announced the arrests.  full story

Slovak celebrity photo shoot in Romani settlement for ELLE magazine prompts racism

Prague, 21.7.2014 20:19, (ROMEA) Slovak recording artists Dara Rolins and Patrik "Rytmus" Vrbovský are featured on the cover of the August issue of the Czech-language edition of ELLE, and the magazine's photo shoot of them in an impoverished Romani settlement has been analyzed primarily by the tabloid press in the Czech Republic and Slovakia. Several online readers have added their racist commentaries to those articles.  full story

videoA Flood Lays Bare Inequality in Bulgaria

Varna, 16.7.2014 12:02, (ROMEA) Asparuhovo district in Varna, Bulgaria, was the hardest hit area during the June 2014 floods. The tragedy is enormous; entire streets and houses have vanished. A total of 14 people were killed, including 4 children. I visited the area weeks after the disaster and the scenes remain apocalyptic.  full story

Czech Radio: Romani priest values the trust people place in him

Jihlava, 14.7.2014 22:42, (ROMEA) A smartphone helps him with his sermons, he leads a rich social life, he goes to the gym, leads mountain hiking trips and designs his own vestments. He recently celebrated his 30th birthday and is the first Roman Catholic priest to come from a Romani environment in today's Czech Republic.  full story

Photographs of the Roma minor whose lynching shocked France

Paris, 20.6.2014 0:02, (ROMEA) Yesterday the online edition of the British daily The Daily Telegraph published a photograph of the Roma youth who was brutally lynched in a Parisian suburb last week by a group of masked assailants. "These are the photographs that are shocking France," The Daily Telegraph reported.  full story

Racism in Northern Ireland: 'They called our children monkeys'

Belfast, 14.6.2014 8:46, (The Guardian) Mixed-race couple tell of daily abuse they faced for six years in Belfast as statistics show a sharp rise in racist incidents  full story

Meet the EU Parliament’s (Likely) First-Elected Feminist Party Member

Stockholm, 24.5.2014 17:36, (ROMEA) Europe's parliamentary elections are expected to end this weekend with a surprising first: The first-ever member elected from a feminist party to the European Parliament. Less surprising is the likely MEP’s country of origin, Sweden. The bastion of gender equality has a nine-year-old feminist political party, the Feminist Initiative (which also has outposts in Germany and France), and it is on track to secure the 4 percent of the country’s vote necessary to send a representative to the EU’s legislative body. At the top of the party’s batting order is Soraya Post, 57, a longtime human rights activist who spoke to the Cut from Stockholm, where she’s wrapping up her campaign.  full story

Czech Republic: Eminent Romani activist says police, not Roma, must keep the peace

Prague, 3.4.2014 20:30, (ROMEA) News server Prvnizpravy.cz has reported today that "those in the Czech Republic who worship the Nazi ideology have announced that they will continue yet another series of anti-Romani marches in various places around the country this year. Experience from recent years has shown us that the responsible authorities are incapable of implementing effective prevention so that such excesses do not take place."  full story

Czech NGO: If you don't open the schools to Roma, how can they get jobs?

Brno, 21.2.2014 18:54, (ROMEA) IQ Roma servis, an NGO based in Brno, Czech Republic, sees its main task as convincing Romani people that it is important to attend better schools and convincing Czech parents that the presence of Romani pupils is no reason to enroll their own children elsewhere. The 45 staff and 50 volunteers with the organization help Romani people find jobs, get educations, and reduce their indebtedness.  full story

UK: Right-wing extremists use social networks to propagandize through kidnapping hoax

London, 6.2.2014 22:56, (ROMEA) British newspaper The Independent reports that during the past week, thousands of British users of social networking sites have been sharing a poster calling on people to help a little girl allegedly kidnapped by an "Asian gang". Little "Amy Hamilton", however, doesn't exist - she is the creation of an ultra-right group, Britons against Left-Wing Extremism, who have been using the image for propaganda purposes.  full story

Czech Republic: New law would mean thousands at risk of homelessness

Brno, 3.2.2014 17:31, (ROMEA) News server iDNES.cz reports that more than 3 000 socially excluded people live in residential hotels throughout the Czech city of Brno. A forthcoming amendment would restrict residency in such facilities to the length of one year but does not address what would happen to those who have to move away after a year's time.  full story