Monthly Archives: September 2022

Germany News Eastern Europe News Western Europe Ukraine

Germany and Ukrainian Roma

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The German State of Baden-Wuerttemberg supports the integration of Roma displaced from the Ukraine. All offers for refugees should also be available to members of the Roma minority and other Romani-speaking people.

Apart from the fact that few non-Roma speak Romanes (they probably wanted to include Sinti), this is welcome.

Italy News Western Europe

Italy and Roma Culture

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Three days to celebrate Roma culture: on October 3, 4 and 6 there will be the twenty-ninth edition of the Amico Rom international art competition. For the first time the event will take place in three cities simultaneously: Laterza in the province of Taranto, Lanciano in the province of Chieti and Campobasso. It is a contest of “literature dedicated to Roma and written by Roma”, explains the statement.

Germany News Western Europe

Germany and Discrimination

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The Freiburg Roma Office has presented its fourth discrimination report. It collects subjective experiences of discrimination by Sinti and Roma, as well as reflections on the coexistence of majority society and minorities and the communication between them.

News Eastern Europe Slovakia

Slovakia and Racism

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On Tuesday, the National Council (NR) of the Slovak Republic approved the working definition of anti-Roma racism developed by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA). This was reported by the Slovak TASR agency. Slovak Roma representative Ján Hero welcomed the decision of the NR SR.

News Eastern Europe Slovakia

Slovakia – Attacks

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Many years have passed since the terrifying attacks on Roma families in the settlement in Záhorská Ves. From 2003 to 2007, unknown masked criminals attacked the local Roma with sticks several times and even set fire to the house where they lived. Well, on the morning of Monday, September 26, 2022, the case took a major turn. Elite NAKA policemen detained members of the criminal group of the takáčov gang, after which horrifying information about years of unexplained attacks on Roma in Záhorská Ves came to light. NAKA accused the mayor Boris Šimkovič and the boss of the takáčovci gsng, Ivan Mego. After the intervention of NAKA, 19 people are accused and 9 detained.

News Eastern Europe Serbia

Serbia – Romodrom

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The ROMODROM event will open on October 1, 2022. at 8 p.m. in the Ciglana club with a discussion entitled “Roma in Serbian cinematography” . Participants in the debate are Goran Gocić , writer, journalist and film critic, Sreten Jovanović , film producer, Radenko Ranković , professor of film production and Gordana Nešić , journalist. The talk will be followed by a treat for music connoisseurs, a concert by the AMARO DEL group.

The ROMODROM project, will see several manifestations whose aim is educating the majority population about culture, traditional heritage and the participation of Roma in the cultural and socio-scientific life of our country. It is aimed at overcoming the gap created by centuries of stereotypical views of the Roma. Through cooperation with various artists and scientists of both Roma and non-Roma origin, the idea is to encourage and strengthen the healthy national pride of the Roma, which has been shaken over time and sometimes even led to negation.

News Eastern Europe North Macedonia

North Macedonia – Renovations

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Soon 27 Roma families from the Bair neighbourhood in Bitola will be able to renovate their homes. The project “Bair – Joint action of Bitola for the inclusion of Roma”, will fund the renovations but after the legalization of the buildings, and the acquisitions of title deeds.

This is always an issue in Roma neighbourhood where many houses simply do not have any deeds, even in cases where the houses have stood there for many years.

News Eastern Europe Poland

Papuša

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Bronisława Wajs, better known as Papuša was a famous Polish Romni and poet. She wrote a diary and almost 200 pages of her notes have survived. She wrote: “My origin. Daddy was from Warmijaki and Berniks (a group of Polish Roma), mummy from Galician Gypsies.” “A better family from a father. I do not remember my father well, I was five when he died in Siberia (around 1914). Mummy married Jan Wajs Jan after eight years … I felt good for one, but bad for the other, because I couldn’t read when I was twelve ”.

She did not write in which year and in which town she was born (it is known that her mother’s name was Katarzyna Zielińska). In the excellent book by Angelika Kuźniak entitled From Papusza, we can read that the poet was born on August 17, 1908 in Sitaniec near Zamość, or on May 10, 1910 in Lublin. Whereas Jerzy Ficowski, a poet, prose writer, essayist and translator, in the book entitled “Gypsies on Polish roads” only wrote that Papusza was born in 1909 or 1910.

News Switzerland

Lausanne and Beggars

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The canton of Vaud is debating on the extension  of the begging interdiction that was issued by the city of Lausanne. The city and its police chief are strongly for it while the canton seems to be sceptical. In any case, begging interdictions are inefficient at best. They have been tried in many places without success and are actually aimed at very few people: In Lausanne, a scientific study that followed all beggars in the city for one year showed that there were less than 30 at any given point in time, and that each beggar has on average less than 25 CHF per day which is not much in Switzerland.

France News Western Europe

French Chronicle …

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Not much this week in France on Roma. A fight in a Roma camp near Lyon, a “Nuit Tzigane” showing that the French still have not understood the correct terminology, and politicians freed from accusations of racial hatred, as the prosecution took too long …

News Eastern Europe Ukraine

Transcarpathian Ukraine

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Volodymyr Kondur, Head of the National Minorities Department of the Secretariat of the Human Rights Commissioner of the Supreme Council of Ukraine, was on a working visit to Transcarpathia.

They held a number of meetings, in particular, they visited the Roma settlement, and also met with representatives of the Zakarpattia Oblast and Berehiv City Council.

News Eastern Europe Slovenia

Slovenia and Roma

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After the recent events in the Roma settlement of Brezje near Novem mesto, where a 22 years old was shot dead and two were wounded, some mayors in south-eastern Slovenia point to the need for a comprehensive solution to the Roma problem. They propose the establishment of a special interdepartmental working body.

In a letter sent to Prime Minister Robert Golob, the mayor of Novo Mesto, Gregor Macedoni, assesses that the latest tragic confrontation in Brezje, is a new harsh reminder that the Roma issue in south-eastern Slovenia deserves concrete inter-ministerial attention. consideration at the state level.

News Eastern Europe Slovakia

Slovakia, Roma, Discrimination, and Votes

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In Sokoľany, whose written records date back to the 13th century, they organize a Village Day celebration every year (the tradition was disrupted only in the last two years by covid).

However, this year on September 10, it happened for the first time that the celebration was divided into two parts – the Roma had a reception in the settlement, the main celebration was at the football field. Someone says that it was segregation, someone on the contrary – that it was a bonus for the Roma.

In addition, there are suspicions of vote buying for the local municipal elections in a Roma settlement in Eastern Slovakia. Unfortunately, not uncommon in many places.

Czech Republic News Eastern Europe

Czech Elections and Roma Extremism

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In recent years, the number of Roma candidates has increased with each election. This is most logically manifested in municipal elections. It is one of the key priorities of the current Roma Integration Strategy. And that at both the national and European level. In recent weeks, the news server Romea.cz has published a relatively comprehensive overview of Roma candidates for municipal elections in individual cities of the Czech Republic.

Roma run for various parties and movements across the political spectrum. Very often these are the Pirates, the ČSSD, the European Democrats and the Green Party. Many candidates also appear on the candidate lists of the newly founded Roma Luma party. But then we also have cities where our people appear on the candidate lists of populist and extremist parties such as SPD or Trikolora.

In Brno, 26 Romani men and women are running for the newly established union (according to the media, communists, neo-Nazis, the right-wing extremist movement Decent People and others). This does rase questions, as these parties are definitively not pro-Roma.

Hungary News Eastern Europe Serbia

Justice for Roma in Hungary and Serbia

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A report of the discriminations faced by Roma and their lack of possibilities of recourse against these in the judicial system in Hungary and Serbia.  This is bad but not surprising.

Croatia News Eastern Europe

Croatia Census

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According to the final results of the 2021 population census, there are 3,871,883 inhabitants in Croatia. Among them, by nationality, there are 3,547,614 (91.63%) Croats, 123,892 (3.2%) Serbs, 24,131 (0.62%) Bosniaks, 17,980 (0.46%) Roma, and 13,763 (0.36%) Italians.

Bosnian is the mother tongue of 17,531 citizens (0.45%), Italian is the mother tongue of 12,890 (0.33 %) citizens, Romanes is the mother tongue of 15,269 citizens (0.39%), and Albanian is the mother tongue of 13,503 citizens (0.35).

As usual, it is almost impossible to know if the numbers of Roma is anywhere close to reality.

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