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Events scheduled for International Romani Day - 8 April 2013

Czech Republic, 1.4.2013 16:38, (ROMEA) On Monday, 8 April 2013 Romani people worldwide will celebrate International Romani Day. They will commemorate the historic first World Congress of the International Romani Union, which took place near London in 1971, primarily thanks to the initiative of Grattan Puxon and Donald Kenrick of Great Britain, Matéo Maximoff representing French Romani people (the Manouche), Jarko Jovanović of the former Yugoslavia, and other Romani individuals and Romani studies scholars.  full story

Czech Republic: Vietnamese mafia could spoil bid for national minority status

Prague, 30.3.2013 21:32, (ROMEA) Czech Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg, who chairs the Czech Government Council on National Minorities, is planning to submit a proposal to the Government to grant ethnic Belarussians and Vietnamese national minority status. There are 12 officially recognized national minorities in the Czech Republic.  full story

Miroslav Brož: "Social housing" for Romani people will preserve the status quo

Prague, 30.3.2013 19:59, (ROMEA) For quite some time now an agitated discussion has been taking place among experts about so-called "social housing". Such housing should be accessible to people who cannot rent apartments on the open market and who would otherwise end up on the street.  full story

Czech permanent settlement law expired 15 years ago

Prague, 30.3.2013 19:27, (ROMEA) Deeply engrained stereotypes about Romani people, formed in Europe over the course of six centuries, persist today even though various regimes have made efforts to more or less eliminate the stereotypes in various ways. One of those efforts was the forced assimilation of Romani people that began in the fall of 1958 in the former Czechoslovakia with a law on the permanent settlement of vagrant persons.  full story

Slovakia: Punishment for shooter of three Romani victims called absurdly low

Hurbanovo, Slovakia, 28.3.2013 23:12, (ROMEA) The sentence of nine years in prison and an order to undergo psychiatric treatment handed down by a court in Slovakia against municipal police officer Milan Juhász, who shot dead three people and injured two others in Hurbanovo last year, has prompted much reaction. The defendant originally faced the possibility of life in prison, but the judges chose a lighter sentence for him at the suggestion of the prosecutor and after experts testified that he had not been completely sane when he committed the shooting. The verdict has taken effect, as neither side has appealed.  full story

Serbia: Dead Romani youth found in Bečej, racial motivation not yet ruled out

Belgrade/Budapest, 28.3.2013 16:10, (ROMEA) In the early morning hours of Sunday, 17 March 2013, a dead 17-year-old Romani boy was found in the Serbian town of Bečej. The circumstances of his death are unclear and it is possible he was the victim of a racially motivated attack.  full story

Czech town orders slumlord to remove tons of garbage from condemned building

Ústí nad Labem, Předlice, 28.3.2013 15:36, (ROMEA) News server iDNES.cz reports that the Ústí nad Labem town hall has ordered the removal of tons of garbage from a building in the Předlice quarter. The sad state of the structure was recently pointed out to them by the Konexe association, which helps impoverished Romani people in Ústí nad Labem.  full story

Slovakia: Former municipal cop gets nine years for murdering three Romani people

Bratislava, Slovakia, 28.3.2013 1:22, (ROMEA) A court in Slovakia today sentenced former municipal police officer Milan Juhász to nine years in prison for shooting to death three people and injuring two others last year in the southern town of Hurbanovo. The court also ordered him to undergo psychiatric treatment.  full story

Czech NGO: Dense network of gaming rooms is drowning the poor

Ústí nad Labem, 28.3.2013 0:44, (ROMEA) Staff of the People in Need (Člověk v tísni) organization have mapped the situation concerning the operation of gaming rooms in the Czech town of Ústí nad Labem. More than 100 places there feature video poker machines through which roughly half a billion crowns flow annually.  full story

Czech Museum of Roma Culture could merge with another, community is against it

Brno/Prague, 27.3.2013 16:36, (ROMEA) The Museum of Roma Culture is threatened with the prospect of being merged with the Moravian Museum in Brno on the basis of the first phase of saving measures approved by the Czech Government at its meeting on 16 January 2013. At its most recent session this past Monday, the Inter-ministerial Commission on Roma Community Affairs has expressed its disagreement with this plan.  full story

Commentary: Czech antigypsyism, or, a report on the state of the country

Prague, 26.3.2013 23:57, (ROMEA) I have been systematically reporting on the lives of people living in ghettos, the activity of the ultra-right, and the state of the media with respect to the topic of Romani people, including analysis and criticism. My experiences in doing this work, or rather the topics I have been involved with during it, are alarming.  full story

videoWe Laugh Together, We Educate Together: A Hungarian Campaign on Inclusive Education

Budapest, 26.3.2013 11:10, (ROMEA) The Hungarian civil society organization UCCU Roma Informal Education Foundation recently launched a campaign film designed to raise awareness and encourage discussion on the issue of inclusive education in Hungary. The film offers an accessible way into the subject, and aims to combat the attitudes and prejudices that have resulted in a segregated and “closed” education system in Hungary.  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

Amnesty International: Human rights here, Roma rights now!

Brussels, 26.3.2013 10:07, (ROMEA) Launch of campaign to end discrimination against Roma in Europe  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

videoCzech court upholds acquittal, light sentence for assailants of human rights monitor

Most, 26.3.2013 1:04, (ROMEA) An appeals court has once again reviewed the November 2008 assault of activist Ondřej Cakl during a neo-Nazi demonstration at the Janov housing estate in Litvínov. The court did not accept Cakl's reasoning and has upheld the sentence handed down against one of the assailants by the first-instance court. The appeals court also upheld the acquittal of a second alleged assailant  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

German court convicts kidnappers of infant from Czech Republic

Koblenz, Germany, 25.3.2013 16:53, (ROMEA) The state court in the German town of Koblenz has sentenced the two kidnappers of a newborn girl from the town of Trmice in the Ústí Region of the Czech Republic to four and a half years in prison. The verdict has yet to take effect.  full story

videoCzech cops edited footage of brutal intervention against Romani woman for media

Prague, 25.3.2013 1:04, (ROMEA) TV Nova, the Czech Republic's most-watched private television channel, has managed to acquire video footage of a controversial intervention by municipal police in the town of Rokycany during which a pram with an infant in it was overturned on the street. The 16-month-old boy escaped serious injury through sheer luck.  full story

Czech Helsinki Committee publishes shadow report on discrimination and racism

Prague, 23.3.2013 19:44, (ROMEA) On the occasion of the International Day against Racism, the Czech Helsinki Committee (Český helsinský výbor - ČHV) has published a shadow report on racism in the Czech Republic and in Europe. The report is issued annually by the European Network against Racism (ENAR), an umbrella organization of hundreds of human rights groups from 26 countries.This most recent report maps the situation during 2011 and part of 2012. The English-language summary report, "Racism in Europe", is available here: http://www.romea.cz/dokumenty/SR_EU-2012.pdf  full story