News

Slovak PM sharply criticizes minorities

Martin, Slovakia, 28.2.2013 16:59, (ROMEA) A dispute has flared up in Slovakia over whether bus stops and railway stations in areas predominantly inhabited by the Hungarian minority should be labeled bilingually. Slovak PM Robert Fico added fuel to the fire yesterday, saying he wants what he referred to as minority rights extortion to stop, whether it be on the part of an ethnic minority, minority opinion-holders, or the Romani minority.  full story

Czechs fathering children with non-EU mothers could face DNA tests

Prague, 27.2.2013 23:48, (ROMEA) Czech men who father a child with a foreign woman from a non-EU country may be required to undergo DNA testing as of next year. If they have not married the mother of their daughter or son and want their child to have Czech citizenship, they may first have to prove their paternity. A draft law on citizenship under discussion in the lower house has proposed the measure.  full story

Slovakia: Two men charged with assaulting black basketball player

Nitra, Slovakia, 27.2.2013 22:56, (ROMEA) Police in the Slovak town of Nitra charged two 21-year-old men yesterday with attacking Jean Rony Cadot, a black basketball player for the Nitra team. The assault was sparked by an argument in the Devil's Pub in Nitra after someone spilled a drink on Cadot's pants there.  full story

Czech Republic: Youth gives Nazi salute, racist abuse to Romani bus driver

Ústí nad Labem, 26.2.2013 22:29, (ROMEA) On Monday 25 February a Romani trolleybus driver had to call a municipal police patrol to deal with a young man who assaulted him verbally, shouted racist slogans and gave the Nazi salute. The driver, himself a former municipal police officer, called his former colleagues to take charge of the youth and remove him from the bus, as his behavior was not just an assault on the driver, but was bothering his fellow passengers.  full story

Czech EdMin to research number of children educated as disabled

Prague, 26.2.2013 16:38, (ROMEA) News server iDNES.cz reports that the Czech Education Ministry wants to find out how many pupils are being taught according to an educational program for children with "light brain dysfunction". The Czech Republic has long faced criticism that it enrolls large numbers of Romani pupils into what were once called the "special schools" who do not belong there. Better record-keeping is one step toward correcting the situation.  full story

Slovakia: Two settlement children die in the ruins of an unoccupied building

Lomnička, Slovakia, 26.2.2013 2:10, (ROMEA) The Slovak Republic Press Agency (Tisková agentura Slovenské republiky - TASR) reports that two children died just after 12 PM yesterday in the village of Lomnička (Stará Ľubovňa district). The children were buried by the collapsed ruins of an unoccupied building in their settlement. Pavol Vravec, the operations commander for the Regional Directorate of the Emergency and Firefighting Corps in Prešov, said seven firefighters intervened at the scene using heat-seeking cameras to search the ruins for survivors.  full story

Commentary: Did Romani activist cause CZK 10 million damage?

Prague, 24.2.2013 20:46, (ROMEA) Ladislav Bílý, the chair of the Romani Civic Association (Romské občanské sdružení) was sentenced this week to six years in prison for subsidy fraud. According to information in the media, he committed the fraud between 2007 and 2010 when he requested subsidies in the name of the association from the municipality of Karlovy Vary, the Karlovy Vary Regional Authority, and the Czech Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs and submitted a falsified confirmation of solvency with his application.  full story

US clinic keeps black staff away from white newborn

Detroit, Michigan, USA, 23.2.2013 20:28, (ROMEA) Several black nurses recently filed charges against a clinic in the US state of Michigan after its management acceded to an illegal request to ban black staff from coming into contact with a hospitalized patient. The Associated Press reports that it is an "open secret" that health care facilities in the USA often make it possible for patients to refuse treatment by doctors and nurses who are not of their same race.  full story

Slovakia: Brutal attack on black basketball player under investigation

Nitra, Slovakia, 23.2.2013 19:49, (ROMEA) News server SME.sk reports that basketball player Jean Rony Cadot has suffered a brutal assault in Slovakia. The player, who was born in the Bahamas, has been playing in the Slovak league since last fall. He was attacked and beaten in front of a nightclub in the town of Nitra.  full story

Right-wing British press warns of "beggar" influx in 2014

Boston, UK, 23.2.2013 18:36, (ROMEA) Agence France-Presse reports that the town of Boston in Great Britain has begun to resemble a small corner of Eastern Europe, where butcher shops feature wreaths of Polish kielbasa and vodka on the shelves and people converse in Latvian and Lithuanian on the street. According to the latest census, more than 10 % of the inhabitants of the quiet little town in the county of Lincolnshire in eastern England is from one of the formerly communist countries that joined the European Union at the start of the millennium.  full story

Commentary: Martin Luther King, Jr's testament for Romani people

Prague, 22.2.2013 22:11, (ROMEA) This piece was composed as an introductory contribution to a debate about Martin Luther King, Jr in Prague that was convened by the American Center and the Slon publishing house, which has released the first selection of Dr King's works in Czech translation.  full story

Italy: Two Romani people die in fire, investigation ongoing

Giugliano, Italy, 22.2.2013 19:16, (ROMEA) Two Romani people from Eastern Europe, most probably from Romania, died this week in a fire that destroyed three shanties at a "Gypsy campsite" in the Neapolitan town of Giugliano.  full story

Czech High Court removes defendants' attorney from "machete case"

Liberec, 22.2.2013 18:27, (ROMEA) The Czech Press Agency reports that Judge Eva Drahotová, the chair of Regional Court in Liberec, has informed them that the High Court in Prague has removed attorney Klára Samková from representing defendants in the case of the so-called "machete attack" in Nový Bor during which three people were seriously injured. "The High Court has decided that Dr Samková can no longer represent any of the defendants," the judge said.  full story

Slovak PM wants Romani children to attend boarding schools

Bratislava, Slovakia, 21.2.2013 23:26, (ROMEA) Slovak PM Fico is proposing what he has himself termed "extreme measures" for Romani children, namely, that they be educated at boarding schools. Peter Pollak, the Slovak Government Plenipotentiary for the Romani Community, does not agree with this solution.  full story

Hungary: Swastikas, SS symbols legal to display as of May

Budapest, Hungary, 21.2.2013 23:03, (ROMEA) On Tuesday, the Hungarian Constitutional Court abolished a statute banning the public use of symbols of totalitarian power. The symbols concerned are the hammer and sickle, the Nazi swastika, and the red five-pointed star. The court said the ban violated the right to freedom of speech and was not worded precisely enough  full story

Czech NGO: Předlice quarter is hostage to illegal drugs

Ústí nad Labem-Předlice, 21.2.2013 21:47, (ROMEA) The People in Need (Člověk v tísni) organization has published an interview on its website with Radka Kobližková, the director of the Contact Center of the DRUG-OUT Klub civic association about the Předlice quarter in Ústí nad Labem and its residents' problem with drugs. News server Romea.cz is publishing the article in full translation below with the kind permission of People in Need.  full story

Commentary: The difference between Czech and French politicians

Prague, 21.2.2013 19:27, (ROMEA) This is really interesting: One comment by Maurice Taylor, head of the American firm Titan International, about the work morale of the French employees of a Goodyear factory has upset almost all of France. Taylor wrote to the French Government that "French employees receive high wages but work only three hours. They get hour-long breaks for snacks and lunch, talk for three hours and work for three." He went on to add that he is no longer interested in French workers or preserving the factory in France and would therefore be closing it.  full story

Czech Republic: Good and bad examples of helping the poor

Prague, 21.2.2013 18:47, (ROMEA) News server Novinky.cz reports that yesterday, 20 February, was the World Day of Social Justice, an effort to draw attention to the topic of poverty and social problems. According to the EU Statistical Office, 15 % of the population of the Czech Republic is jeopardized by poverty and social exclusion, defined as suffering from material deprivation or working less than 20 % of what ordinarily constitutes a full-time work year.  full story

Czech Republic: Romani NGO founder says his trial proved nothing

Karlovy Vary, 21.2.2013 17:50, (ROMEA) Ladislav Bílý, who is appealing a verdict sentencing him to six years in prison for alleged subsidy fraud, has provided news server Romea.cz an essential statement on the case. Bílý made the statement as part of online discussions posted beneath the articles on Romea.cz about the verdict and in discussions posted to social networking sites. Some discussants believe Bílý misused the finances of the Romani Civic Association in Karlovy Vary, bu he denies those charges in his statement.  full story

Czech Republic: Stronger efforts needed to end segregation of Roma

Strasbourg, 21.2.2013 10:13, (ROMEA) “Segregation of Roma children in education remains a serious human rights concern in the Czech Republic. Many of them are still taught as children with mild disabilities, in contravention of the 2007 D.H. judgment of the European Court of Human Rights which condemned the Czech Republic for this practice. Urgent action is needed to remedy this shortcoming”, said today Nils Muižnieks, Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights, releasing a report based on the findings of his visit to this country carried out on 12-15 November 2012, which focused on the human rights of Roma and persons with disabilities.  full story