Category Archives: Slovakia

News Eastern Europe Slovakia

Slovakia and Roma Settlements

Published by:

Slovakia and Roma Settlements

The Plenipotentiary of the Government of the Slovak Republic for Roma Communities Alexander Daško, who has been in place for 15 months, says that there have been enough concepts and analyses, and that one already knows everything about the living conditions in the communities, now we need to work. He also claims that nothing has been done in the last 30 years. He added that changes will take a long time.

Fact is, fires such as the one in Veľký Šaris will continue to happen, for as long as people have to resort to burning plastic in stoves to heat their homes.

Czech Republic News Eastern Europe Slovakia

Commemoration

Published by:

Commemoration

On Saturday evening, Romani students during the BARUVAS meeting in Brno symbolically joined the memorial service for the victims of the tragic fire in the Romani settlement in Veľký Šariš, Slovakia. Each of the twenty-five participants lit a candle and together honored the memory of four small children and their great-grandmother who died in the night fire.

 

News Eastern Europe Slovakia

Veľký Šariš

Published by:

Veľký Šariš

In cooperation with the government’s plenipotentiary for Roma communities, Alexander Dašek the city administration is working on a housing solution for the people who lost their homes in the fire in the Roma settlement.

News Eastern Europe Slovakia

Lunik IX and Education

Published by:

Lunik IX and Education

Michaela Cingeľová, a unique teacher who decided to go to teach at the Ľudmila Podjavorinská Elementary School in Luník IX four years ago. This is one of the most notorious ghettos in Slovakia.

 In addition, she founded a project in her hometown that makes Roma children look forward to going to school on Saturdays.

News Eastern Europe Slovakia

Slovakia: Fire

Published by:

Slovakia: Fire

Many articles in the Slovak and in the Czech press about the fire in the Roma settlement of Veľkém Šariši which killed 4 children and a woman and destroyed several houses. Alexander Daško, the government’s plenipotentiary for Roma communities, went in the settlement in the Prešov region. He wants to go to Brussels and provide modular housing for the Roma in the settlements.

Up till now, he hasn’t done much to help and is heavily criticised.

News Eastern Europe Slovakia

Slovakia: Fire

Published by:

Slovakia: Fire

The fire in a Roma settlement in Veľký Šariš on March 19th claimed the lives of four young children and one adult woman and burnt 8 homes to the ground. It has severely affected not only the local Roma community, but also the general public. Roma activists, politicians and representatives of institutions are reacting to the tragedy. Roma leader Jozef Stojka called on Roma in Slovakia, the Czech Republic and throughout the European Union to light a candle in memory of the victims on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. According to him, the tragedy revealed a long-term crisis in the state’s approach to marginalized Roma communities.

News Eastern Europe Slovakia

Slovakia: Displaced

Published by:

Slovakia: Displaced

The mayor of the municipality of Dolné Vestenice in Slovakia, Viliam Šuhajda, declared an emergency situation for the territory of the municipality, specifically in the Kopanice part, with effect from March 19, 2025 at 3:00 p.m. The reason for this decision is slope deformation, which poses a serious risk to residents and infrastructure in the area.

The issue: Below that slope lies a Roma settlement. And the municipality said they had no alternative place to resettle them…

News Eastern Europe Slovakia

Slovakia: Deaf Roma

Published by:

Slovakia: Deaf Roma

A conference entitled We Create a Community of Deaf Roma Together: Deaf Roma as an Invisible Minority was dedicated to discussing the challenges faced by the deaf Roma community, as well as finding concrete solutions supporting inclusion. It will took place on Tuesday in a café on Svätopluková Street in Prešov. As the director of the civic association Svet ticha Tomáš Dunko it also highlighted the results of mapping deaf Roma living in socially excluded localities.

According to Dunko, who is deaf and sign language Roma, this is a relatively new topic that is little known in Slovakia. But it affects a large number of people who experience linguistic and social isolation without sufficient support from the state and society.

News Eastern Europe Slovakia

Slovakia: Famous Photo

Published by:

Slovakia: Famous Photo

David Neff won the Czech Press Photo for his photo of the tragic floods in a Roma settlement in eastern Slovakia, but his main protagonist, Sister Atanázie Holubová, was not too thrilled with the photo. “I was a little angry with him. Why do you still have to take pictures of it?”

The flood occurred in Jarovnice on July 20th, 1998.

News Eastern Europe Slovakia

Racism Stories in Slovakia

Published by:

Racism Stories in Slovakia

An article with testimonies of racism towards Roma, but also Ukrainians, Moslems, etc.

“He shouted at us that we gypsies should not be here, that we stink, that we should sit in the back and not in the front, that they treat us like gypsies, that we are dirty gypsies.”

“I faced discrimination when they refused to serve me in a café and a bar because of my Romani origin. It was very humiliating and embarrassing for me.”

News Eastern Europe Slovakia

Erika Rein

Published by:

Erika Rein

Young singer Erika Rein is a prominent figure in the Slovak music scene and could win the Debut of the Year and Album of the Year awards. She sings in Slovak, English and Romanes and makes catchy pop songs.

News Eastern Europe Slovakia

Slovakia and the Tiso Regime

Published by:

Slovakia and the Tiso Regime

Hana Kubátová (45) is a historian, she is dedicated to Holocaust research, and works at the Faculty of Social Sciences of Charles University in Prague. Her book “Where Foxes Say Good Night” about the relationship between Christian nationalism and the Holocaust in Slovakia is currently being published. She says: “When the Tiso regime wanted to create “new Slovaks”, it was easier to say who did not belong to them”. Roma and Jews were definitively part of the New Slovaks…

Czech Republic News Eastern Europe Slovakia

Roma and Czechoslovak Socialism

Published by:

Roma and Czechoslovak Socialism

Efforts to resolve the issue of coexistence between the Roma community and the majority society started with the newly established independent Czechoslovak Republic in 1918. State policy was primarily bureaucratic and repressive in nature. After 1948 and the rise of the communist party, the position of the Roma in Czechoslovakia deteriorated significantly. This situation then escalated further during the era of so-called normalization. The socialist regime tried unsuccessfully to assimilate the Roma minority.

The article dwell on travellers, of which there were very few in the region, but does not speak much about the resettlement after the war.

News Eastern Europe Slovakia

Slovakia and Roma

Published by:

Slovakia and Roma

Another article on the survey of attitudes towards Roma in Slovakia. Here, they say that 70% of the respondents would object if their child was to marry someone from the Romani community, and that 46% would object travelling next to Roma.

Unfortunately, not surprising.

News Eastern Europe Slovakia

Slovakia: Interview

Published by:

Slovakia: Interview

An interview with Lana Gazov, an activist who created founded the Kamiben profile, which connects Roma and non-Roma about the belief in Slovakia, that social benefits are tilted towards Roma and about her life as a Romni in Slovakia and abroad.

News Eastern Europe Slovakia

Slovakia: Special Schools

Published by:

Slovakia: Special Schools

Public Defender of Rights (VOP) Róbert Dobrovodský considers the incorrect placement of children from marginalized Roma communities in the special education system to be an extremely serious violation of the right to education. According to him, this has irreversible negative consequences for their future, as well as negative consequences for society as a whole. The Ombudsman pointed this out in connection with the decision of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) in the case of Salay v. the Slovak Republic, in which it found a violation of the right to education and the prohibition of discrimination against a pupil of Roma origin by his placement in a special class for children with mild mental disabilities.

Unfortunately, placing Roma children in special schools happens still too often.

News Eastern Europe Slovakia

Reportage on Tomáš Csics

Published by:

Reportage on Tomáš Csics

He is a Rom, an engineer, and an activist and influencer followed by thousands of people. At school, he was always reminded that he was just a gypsy. “Don’t go to college, Roma will only be hired for lower jobs anyway.” These are the words that begin one of the videos posted on. On social media, he proves with his story that Roma do not have to end up in factories for the lower grades, but can have big dreams and ambitions, just like he had. He achieved success despite growing up in poverty and encountering those who didn’t wish him well along the way.

News Eastern Europe Slovakia

Slovakia and Segregated Schools

Published by:

Slovakia and Segregated Schools

An article about the systemic racism against Roma in Slovakia, especially in the school system and on court cases against it, the latest one being from a school in an excluded Roma community in the village of Stráne pod Tatrami.

The article also says that the current prime minister Robert Fico approved Milan Mazurek’s statements about “gypsy anti-social groups” and “zoological gardens”, to which he compared the Roma school, in 2019. He was convicted for his words, but still continues.

News Eastern Europe Slovakia

Roma Ball in Prešov, Slovakia

Published by:

Roma Ball in Prešov, Slovakia

The Roma Ball of Understanding was organized in Prešov. Roma also came from abroad. People from the majority also had fun to the tunes of the cymbalum with the youngest primash Samin from the Ďusi Band Orchestra. “Until the Roma songs start playing, people are like petrified,” laughed the main organizer Juraj Kýr.

rroma.org
en_GBEN
de_DEDE fr_FRFR en_GBEN