Category Archives: Ukraine

News Eastern Europe Poland Ukraine

Romnja in Poland

Published by:

“Being a Roma woman is being a warrior.” Racism is everyday life for Roma. “We are independent, we are strong and we make our dreams come true” – this is how 28-year-old Olena, a lawyer from Ukraine, replied to the question about what Romani women are like. Olena is one of the 6 heroines of the second instalment of the series of portraits of Roma women prepared by the W Torona Dialogu Foundation. The goal of the campaign is clear – it’s time for Roma women to come out of the shadows and talk about themselves on their own terms and in their own words.

News Eastern Europe Poland Ukraine

Poland and Roma Refugees

Published by:

According to the article, roughly 25’000 Roma from Ukraine fled to Poland, and these were overwhelmingly illiterate. This probably means they missed quite of few Roma who did not conform to the stereotypes.

A book on this exodus, called “The War of our Times” was published.

News Eastern Europe Poland Ukraine

Ukrainian Roma Refugees in Poland

Published by:

About three to four hundred Ukrainian Roma refugees are housed in a recreation complex in Poręba Wielka, in Poland’s Gorce mountains. The recreation complex belongs to a controversial entrepreneur who is being accused of making money with the refugees.

The people in the regions complain about these Roma refugees and fear that they will be robbed.

News Eastern Europe Ukraine

Lviv and Roma

Published by:

Yet another article about the creation of a tent school in a Roma camp in Lviv. These Roma are IDPs and the catholic church created this school. Nice move but what about getting those people to live in decent quarters and also to go to regular schools?

News Eastern Europe Ukraine

Lviv: Tent School

Published by:

Another article in the Ukrainian press about the tent school set up in a Roma refugee camp by a catholic priest. There are quite a few photos that show the precarity of the camp. Maybe it would be better to lodge these IDPs correctly and send the children to a regular school…

News Eastern Europe Ukraine

Lviv, Roma, and the Church

Published by:

On October 9, the Roman Catholic Church organized a school where both children and adults can study in the Roma camp near the bypass road of Lviv.

This is good, but is also coupled with a strong push to convert, even though the vast majority of Roma there are Orthodox.

News Eastern Europe Ukraine

Babyn Yar

Published by:

82 years ago today, the massacre of Babyn Yar started. It had been preceded by the execution two days earlier of some Jewish and mentally ill patients two days earlier.

The Nazis killed mostly Jews, but also Roma, Russian POWs and many others. The Mayor of Kyiv, Vitaliy Klyshko and the Ukranian President Volodymyr Zelensky paid homage to the victims.

News Eastern Europe Ukraine

Ukraine and Roma

Published by:

Unfortunately, another one of those (on both sides). Roma were arrested in Kharkiv region in Ukraine for having swindled pensioneers. They were arrested and will be tried.

The issue as usual is that this is depicted as an ethnic trait.

Bad.

News Eastern Europe Poland Ukraine

Poland and Roma Refugees

Published by:

Joanna Talewicz-Kwiatkowska, with her foundation, tried for several months to find an apartment for a family of Roma refugees from Ukraine. No chance. – I never thought I would see such a moment – says the activist with regret. And he emphasizes that the Roma are treated worse than others, even though they are also fleeing from the war.

Germany News Eastern Europe News Western Europe Ukraine

Roma Refugees

Published by:

Apparently, there is a recent influx in Germany of Roma with brand new Ukrainian passports but who also have Hungarian passports asking for asylum. No one seems to know whether they are Ukrainian or Hungarian, and they speak Hungarian.

The most prosaic answer to this is that they are most probably from Transcarpathian Ukraine, and that thanks to the Hungarian Prime Minister, they were able to get a Hungarian passport as Hungarian speakers living abroad. Orban did grant Hungarian citizenship to Hungarian speakers outside of the country since quite a while.

News Eastern Europe Ukraine

Kharkiv: Roma Robbers

Published by:

The police in Kharkiv arrested four Roma (the article says it is a “gang”) who robbed and robbed elderly people during the war. The bandits took 1.8 million hryvnias worth of money and property from the homes of the victims.

“The perpetrators came to the homes of the elderly and presented themselves as volunteers distributing humanitarian aid. Under this pretext, the suspects entered the apartments of the victims, after which they stole their property, money and openly robbed,” the prosecutor’s office said.

News Eastern Europe Ukraine

Ukraine, Roma, and Education

Published by:

In Ukraine, among the legal problems faced by Roma, education stands out as a separate topic. About 20% of the adult population of the Roma community have no education and have never attended school as reported by the Secretariat of the Verkhovna Rada Commissioner for Human Rights.

As usual, 20% of what …

“Among a number of legal, social, and economic problems, one of the key ones remains the issue of Roma access to education. The educational level of the Roma population in general remains extremely low. According to the latest research by Roma public organizations, about 20% of the adult population do not have any education and have never attended school,” the message reads.

News Eastern Europe Ukraine

Ukraine, War, and Minorities

Published by:

Roma displaced by the war still have problems with access to the labour market in the Ukraine. According to a study by an international charitable organization, which was conducted in May 2023 among Roma immigrants in the Dnipropetrovsk, Zaporizhzhya, Odesa, and Zakarpattia regions, the situation has improved.

However, there still are integration problems, discrimination, access to the labour market and ensuring the financial independence of immigrant families, information, and children’s access to education. The most difficult situation is in the Dnipropetrovsk and Zaporizhzhia regions.

Czech Republic News Eastern Europe Ukraine

Czech Republic, Roma, and Ukrainians

Published by:

Some Czech Roma are protesting about the release of the Ukrainian who killed a Rom in Brno recently. He is no longer in jail but on bail. The release of the murderer from the Brno case is a slap in the face of the Roma. “One less gypsy, so what?” according to Romani leader Tancoš.

These confrontations between Ukrainian refugees and Roma have not been good. Some Roma sided with some extreme right parties to complain about Ukrainian refugees. Our attitude is: Let’s see what justice says about this case. It is definitively bad that the suspect was released on bail, with the judge expressing doubt about this being a murder.

News Eastern Europe Poland Ukraine

Ukrainian Roma Refugees in Poland

Published by:

The Fundacja w Stronę Dialogu [Towards Dialogue Foundation] has published a monitoring report for 2022-2023 entitled “They are not refugees, but travelers” on the situation of Roma refugees in the Podkarpackie Voivodeship. The material presented in the report was collected by the foundation’s team during regular local visits in the Podkarpackie Voivodeship, mainly in Przemyśl, conducted from March 2022 to May 2023.

According to the report, in addition to unequal treatment, Roma face widespread anti-Gypsyism, and the challenges they face when fleeing are particularly acute. As a result of the outbreak of war, assistance for this group took on a new dimension: substandard support in reception points and places of collective accommodation.

News Eastern Europe Ukraine

Ukraine and IDPs

Published by:

The Uzhhorod City Council violates the right of internally displaced Roma to housing and social protection. The resettled Roma sent an appeal to the Office of the Ombudsman of Ukraine, claiming discrimination on the basis of ethnicity. In the appeal, representatives of the national minority complain that the Uzhhorod City Council violates their rights to housing and social protection.

The applicants with their families and minor children are internally displaced citizens, so they currently live in the premises of the local multidisciplinary lyceum in Uzhgorod, in the Zakarpattia region. One of the displaced women has a newborn baby.

rroma.org
en_GBEN
de_DEDE fr_FRFR en_GBEN