Monthly Archives: Januar 2023

Czech Republic: Roma Integration

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Last week, the Commissioner for Roma Minority Affairs, Lucie Fuková, met with the Deputy Prime Minister for Digitization and the Minister for Regional Development, Ivan Bartoš. They discussed the functioning of the Agency for Social Inclusion and the solution to the social exclusion of Roma not only in economically disadvantaged regions.

Slovakia, Poverty and Hunger

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A blog article in Slovakia that reflects many stereotypes. Young Roma groomed for begging for food. They are dirty, badly dressed. And among them, one exemplary young Rom who doesn’t want to turn out like his parents.

What the blog is mentions is that the shop in the village is 30 to 50% more expensive than the supermarket. The blogger misses the fact that these Roma cannot go to the supermarket, as they have no car…

In brief, a very bad article.

Slovakia, School, and Roma

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Up to 99 percent of the students of the Hungarian-language Lajos Mocsáry Elementary School in Fiľakovo, headed by Ildikó Kotlárová (55), are Roma. She also is a Romni, from the Olah (Vlach) group. While traditionally, women from this group marry very early, thus interrupting their studies, she chose a different path and today, is a role model for many. In the interview, she says that many of the pupils in school come hungry. It is bad.

German Evangelical Church and Roma

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The head of the council of the Evangelical Church in Germany, Anette Kurschus, acknowledged that her church was involved in the exclusion of Sinti and Roma during the National Socialist period. Kurschus said in Berlin that the Evangelical Church took many blamable actions. The church was involved in betraying people and handing them over to be destroyed. Kurschus also announced an increased commitment against today’s discrimination of the minority.

This is a historical event. When will the other denominations follow?

Slovenia and Roma

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Around two hundred Roma live in the municipality of Šentjernej in Slovenia in several. Roma representatives in the local administration are now boycotting the sessions of the municipal council. Darka Brajdič, the former elected Roma representative, says without hesitation what bothers her about her work so far in the Šentjernej municipal council:

“I was not heard, much less considered. In the last mandate, the current mayor has never been among the Roma, he does not know how they live, what needs and opportunities they have. In our municipality, Roma families are not treated the same as others, they even oppose Roma if they want to do something themselves.”

France, the Holocaust, and Roma

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A conference in Strasbourg on the Alsatian criminal police and the persecution of Sinti and Roma between 1940 and 1944.

At last one speaks about it.

French Chronicle …

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French television presents a movie about a young Romni who studies and wants to escape an arranged marriage, which according to the television is the tradition among Roma. Not quite correct, after all stereotypes are always ok about Roma. Other news are more usual: A fire in a camp in Fresnes and residents in Thiais protesting delays of closing a camp, both near Paris. And a house that was squatted by Roma in Grenoble is destroyed.

The Church and Roma

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The Church of England took a positive step and recognized that the church played a significant role in anti-Roma racism.  When are the other churches (and also non-Christian denominations) going to do the same?

German federal Police and Roma

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The Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) and the Central Council of Sinti and Roma have signed an agreement to take joint action against antigypsyism. The BKA recognizes the working definition of antiziganism of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, as the police authority in Wiesbaden announced. This can be used to counteract racism against Sinti and Roma.

Auschwitz Liberation – The Speech

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“Survivor Marian Turski warned: “Auschwitz did not fall from the sky”. The survivor Halina Birenbaum wrote: “It’s not rain, it’s people”. Auschwitz arose out of lust for power and megalomania. Paradoxically, it was the quintessence of the great progress, industrialization of the 20th century. The camp was thought out, planned, designed, sketched, drawn and expanded. Architects, planners, designers and surveyors worked on it,” said Cywiński, the director of the Auschwitz Museum.

The director of the museum recalled that in this place “German Nazis dehumanized, humiliated and murdered Jews, Poles, Roma, Soviet prisoners of war and many others.” “Here are the authentic remnants of the misalliance of Viennese Romanticism and Prussian Positivism. We see how fragile our civilization is. Our world turned out to be fragile in the era of murderous anti-Semitism, uebermensch ideology and the desire for the so-called Lebensraum. Our world is still fragile.

Piotr Cywiński, addressing former prisoners, recalled that they had gone through “the darkest path of war”. “And it’s hard for us to stand here. Harder than previous years. War first violates treaties, then borders, then people. Civilian victims, dehumanized, intimidated, humiliated, do not die accidentally. They are hostages of this wartime megalomania. Warsaw Wola, Zamojszczyzna, Oradour and Lidice today are called Bucza, Irpień, Hostomel, Mariupol and Donetsk,” he stressed.

The director of the Memorial pointed out that today ‘written in Russian’ is similar to the one from over 78 years ago, sick megalomania, lust for power. The myths about uniqueness, greatness and primacy sound similar.

As Cywiński said, “the period that we used to call the post-war era is clearly ending before our eyes.” “For many decades, the post-war period looked different in the east than in the west of Europe. But on the one hand and on the other hand, our thoughts and identity were held together by the overriding awareness of the post-war period. And here it is today, it all passes. Again, innocent people are dying en masse in Europe. Russia, unable to seize Ukraine, decided to destroy it. We see it every day, even now – standing here. So it’s hard to stay here today,” he said.

The director of the Auschwitz Museum appealed that “we, the free people, should be able to behave differently today”. “To be silent is to give voice to the perpetrators. To remain neutral means to reach out to the rapist. Remaining indifferent is nothing more than giving permission to murderers,” he stressed.

The director emphasized that today, in front of our eyes, memory tells us: I’m checking! “Today you can see very clearly whose doors are opening and whose doors are closed. (…) Let us be aware that our every gesture counts just as every lack of a gesture counts. There is a choice in everything. Today the time has come again for necessary human choices. And only in memory can we find the keys that will guide us through our own choices,” he said.

The director’s speech was the final word at the main anniversary ceremony. Former prisoners spoke in front of him: Eva Umlauf, a Jewess, and a Pole, Zdzisława Włodarczyk.

The Germans established the Auschwitz camp in 1940 to imprison Poles there. Auschwitz II-Birkenau was established two years later. It became a place of extermination of Jews. There was also a network of sub-camps in the camp complex. In Auschwitz, the Germans killed at least 1.1 million people, mainly Jews, as well as Poles, Roma, Soviet prisoners of war and people of other nationalities.

On January 27, 1945, Red Army soldiers opened the gates of the camp. Extremely exhausted prisoners, of whom there were still about 7,000. – including half a thousand children – greeted them as liberators.

Poland and a Roma School

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The Parish Polish-Roma Primary School in Suwałki received a grant from the program of social and civic integration of the Roma in Poland. Thanks to this, the school will enrich its offer for Roma students.

They have been teaching Roma for nearly 30 years. Thanks to the small parish school, the Roma community in Suwałki is perceived better and better. As Fr. Jarema Sykulski, pastor of the Parish of the Sacred Heart of Jesus in Suwałki – Roma in Suwałki are not treated as intruders, as some group that would threaten someone. They are simply part of this climate, the landscape of Suwałki.

Serbia, Police, and Roma

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The European Roma Right Centre and the Vojvoðanski romski centar are taking legal action against the Serbian police for having invaded a Roma home and brutally attacked the Roma.

Let’s see what comes out of it…

Germany: Condemned

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A German Neo Nazi was condemned to two years and eight months of jail for having slashed a Jamaican man with a cutter and nearly killed him as well for having done the Nazi salute in front of the Roma Holocaust Memorial in Berlin, as well as having work several Nazi emblems and symbols.

Roma Holocaust Remembrance Day

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The Austrian constitutional committee voted unanimously in favour of a motion for a resolution by the coalition parties aimed at introducing a National Day of Remembrance for Roma and Sinti. Specifically, it is proposed that the Roma and who were persecuted and murdered under the Nazi regime be commemorated on August 2nd. On this day, the Holocaust victims of this ethnic minority are already being commemorated at European level.

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