30.05.2014 German court decision: Serbia not a safe country of origin for Roma

The administrative court of Stuttgart, in what is perhaps a landmark ruling, recognized the refugee status of two Rroma from Serbia. Thus, it challenged the views of the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees, which at the end of last year came to the conclusion that no persecution of Rroma could be established in Serbia and deportation was therefore justified: “As reasoning, the judges said that the Roma were experiencing extreme disadvantages in their home country and were forced to live on the margins of society, as a spokeswoman for the court said on Monday. The main reason for the judgment was the restriction of the free movement of Roma in the southeast European country. For Roma, under certain circumstances, it is punishable under Serbian law to apply for asylum in another country. This equals a persecution, the court judged.” The verdict has the character of a precedent insofar, because the Rroma are not persecuted in Serbia, according to a federal decree that will be adopted shortly. Thus, the discussion about the discrimination against Rroma in former Yugoslavia and their status as refugees is once more opened. The decision also highlights that the assessment of discrimination against a minority is far from evident and easy. While some assessment are based on the legal foundations of a country, other evaluations are based on everyday practices, such as discrimination in the labour market and the education system, that are far more difficult to prove than law-related disadvantages (see Focus online 2014/I, SWR 2014).

The federal government wants to take a completely different direction. According to the daily newspaper Neues Deutschland (2014) the government wants declare Serbia, Macedonia and Bosnia-Herzegovina as safe countries of origin. German interior minister Thomas de Maizière stated that Cabinet would discuss the bill on April the 30th. De Maizière had previously proposed, to also take Albania and Montenegro onto the list of safe countries of origin, but this proposal failed because of the criticism of the SPD: “SPD and the Union had approved in the coalition agreement, to take the three states of Serbia, Macedonia and Bosnia-Herzegovina onto the list. Asylum applications from people from these Balkan countries can then be processed faster – and are usually rejected. […] De Maizière said that Serbia had candidate status as a member state of the European Union. Albania and Bosnia-Herzegovina went for it. “From these states one must expect that they deal well with their own citizens”, de Maizière said.” This contrasts with a perspective that emphasizes the individual destinies of those affected. For the German Institute for Human Rights, the concept of safe countries of origin is problematic in itself, because it greatly complicates the presentation and verification of individual persecutions (compare Focus online 2014/II).