Category Archives: News Eastern Europe

Frankreich News Osteuropa News Westeuropa Rumänien

08.02.2015 France: Some positive news …

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Not all news in France on Rroma is negative. In the north of France, an association helps Rroma to integrate, to obtain papers and find work. They follow Rroma, mostly from Romania who have been in the region for several years.

In Avignon, the state lodged some 30 Rroma in a camping after having been expulsed from their camp. Probably, the officials thought that as they are “travellers” a camping is the proper thing to do.

Bulgarien News Osteuropa

01.02.2015 Bulgaria: Medics claim attack at hands of Rroma

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A doctor in the Bulgarian town of Vrachesh clains having been attacked by Rroma for being late attending a pregnant Rromni. According to the government, there have been 175 such attacks blamed on Rroma in the last year. The Bulgarian Health Minister,  Peter Moscov, went as far as stating that emergency medical help should be restricted in some Rroma areas. He also stated “he who has chosen to behave like a brute will be treated as one”. Many organisations called for Moscov to resign, and he eventually apologised for his statements.

This problem is a social one, with many Rroma not even having basic health insurance, and not one of Rroma vs. Bulgarians. It is a sheer poverty and ghetto issue. Nothing more, nothing less.

Ungarn News Americas News Osteuropa

01.02.2015 Canada: The Hungarian Rroma Family has to leave

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The Hungarian Rroma family who was fighting the deportation order in Canada have lost their last appeal in Canada’s Federal Court. They now have to leave the country and go back to Hungary where they say they are at risk due to right wing extremists.

Tschechische Republik News Osteuropa

01.02.2015 Paul Polanski and the Lety Concentration Camp

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The Lety Concentration Camp in the Czech Republic, a camp on which site there currently still is a pig farm is once again in the actualities. In this article, it is claimed that Paul Polansky, an amateur historian, brought the facts and existence of this camp to the world’s attention. While Paul Polanski effectively wrote two books on the topic, these were by far not the first ones about Lety (See for example Wickipedia.de on this topic). Fact is, this was one of the early Rroma camps where from many Rroma were deported to death camps.

News Osteuropa

01.02.2015 Remembrance of Auschwitz Liberation

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For the 70th anniversary of Auschwitz liberation on January 27th, the German press published a series of articles on the topic, highlighting the fact that besides Jews, Rroma were also victims of the Holocaust. How many died is still a matter of dispute, with numbers ranging from 250’000 to several millions. Truth will never be known, as, contrary to popular belief, the Germans did not keep accurate track of their deeds. Only people that stayed in camps for forced labour were registered. Those who were gassed upon arrival or simply shot in the woods in numerous places where not registerd. For example, Auschwitz’s registers show only ca. 405’000 registered people, while the estimates of how many were actually killed there range from 1.1 mio to a more probable 2.3 Mio people.

Ungarn News Americas News Osteuropa News Westeuropa

01.02.2015 Canada: The Hungarian Rroma Family has to leave

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The Hungarian Rroma family who was fighting the deportation order in Canada have lost their last appeal in Canada’s Federal Court. They now have to leave the country and go back to Hungary where they say they are at risk due to right wing extremists.

Tschechische Republik News Osteuropa News Westeuropa

01.02.2015 Paul Polanski and the Lety Concentration Camp

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The Lety Concentration Camp in the Czech Republic, a camp on which site there currently still is a pig farm is once again in the actualities. In this article, it is claimed that Paul Polansky, an amateur historian, brought the facts and existence of this camp to the world’s attention. While Paul Polanski effectively wrote two books on the topic, these were by far not the first ones about Lety (See for example Wickipedia.de on this topic). Fact is, this was one of the early Rroma camps where from many Rroma were deported to death camps.

News Osteuropa

01.02.2015 Remembrance of Auschwitz Liberation

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For the 70th anniversary of Auschwitz liberation on January 27th, the German press published a series of articles on the topic, highlighting the fact that besides Jews, Rroma were also victims of the Holocaust. How many died is still a matter of dispute, with numbers ranging from 250’000 to several millions. Truth will never be known, as, contrary to popular belief, the Germans did not keep accurate track of their deeds. Only people that stayed in camps for forced labour were registered. Those who were gassed upon arrival or simply shot in the woods in numerous places where not registerd. For example, Auschwitz’s registers show only ca. 405’000 registered people, while the estimates of how many were actually killed there range from 1.1 mio to a more probable 2.3 Mio people.

Kosovo News Osteuropa

25.01.2015 Visionary leads a Rroma philharmonic Orchestra

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Ricardo Sahiti, born in 1961 in Kosovo dreamt of founding and directing a Rroma philharmonic orchestra. Arte just showed a movie about him and about the orchestra he managed to create and direct.

Visionär macht seinen Traum wahr. In Op.Online.de, 24.01.2015. http://www.op-online.de/lokales/nachrichten/rodgau/riccardo-sahiti-leitet-weltweit-einzige-roma-sinti-philharmonie-4667487.html

Frankreich News Osteuropa News Westeuropa

25.01.2015 Perpignan: Gitans and North Africans Traders at a market.

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Street press reports on the Perpigna market in the South of France where Rroma (Gitan) trades work alongside North African immigrants and where both communities make sure the market is safe for visitors. The article, while positive on the whole, still dishes out a few standard clichés: The Gitans were sedentarised (they always were sendentary), both communities are extremely “masculine” with little space for women, etc. As usual, the Rroma realities are not reflected in the press.

Tschechische Republik Deutschland News Osteuropa News Westeuropa Slowakei

25.01.2015 Remembrance for the liberation of Auschwitz 70 years ago

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The “Förderverein Roma” organises a march on January 27th in Frankfurt to mark the 79th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz Birkenau (Frankfurter Neue Presse). In that camp, with the special Rroma camp in Birkenau, countless Rroma from several countries were killed. The official number is fairly low, as is the case with Jews, as people that were gassed straight away were not registered. However, many Rroma from Czechoslovakia, Austria, Germany and other countries were murdered there.

The Bishop Conference of Germany, for that same commemoration of the liberation liberation of the camp, issued a lengthy statement acknowledging the murder of minorities and other in Auschwitz and appealing for tolerance and help towards others.

Kosovo News Osteuropa

25.01.2015 Visionary leads a Rroma philharmonic Orchestra

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Ricardo Sahiti, born in 1961 in Kosovo dreamt of founding and directing a Rroma philharmonic orchestra. Arte just showed a movie about him and about the orchestra he managed to create and direct.

Visionär macht seinen Traum wahr. In Op.Online.de, 24.01.2015. http://www.op-online.de/lokales/nachrichten/rodgau/riccardo-sahiti-leitet-weltweit-einzige-roma-sinti-philharmonie-4667487.html

Frankreich News Osteuropa News Westeuropa Rumänien

14.01.2015 Nicolas Dupont Aignan … Is ignorance an excuse?

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Interviewed by Metro News on January 5th, the Mayor of Champlan, Essone (France), Mr. Noicolas Dupon Aignan stated “Rroma should be in Romania”. This clearly show that his understanding of the subject   is limited if not non-existent. We do wish that people who obviously have little if any understanding would rather simply avoid the subject rather than blabber the same platitudes and stereotypes as have already been heard for ages.

Roma are not Romanian, although there are Romanian Rroma, and not all Rroma are uneducated migrants begging in the street… Please take note.

Ungarn News Osteuropa

31.12.2014 Bishop of Vac bemoans the situation of Rroma in Hungary

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In his Christmas mass, Miklós Beer, the bishop of Vác bemoaned the prejudices against Rroma in Hungary as well as their current situation. He even showed understanding for Rroma who steal to feed their children. His homely is remarkable as generally the Hungarian views on Rroma are more extreme. The entire text can be seen on YouTube and a very good summary is given in Hungarian Spectrum.

Aladar Horvath, a Rrom and an activist wrote a very good article entitled “Protest, Fight, or Flight” on the current prospects of the Rroma minority in Hungary. He denounces the forthcoming cuts of social benefits that will lead many Rroma, especially in the countryside into further poverty, hunger, and despair. This is a situation that no one in Western Europe seems to want to see, but is the reality for a large group of Hungarian Rroma.

Ungarn News Osteuropa

31.12.2014 Jobbik’s Vona claims not to deny the Holocaust

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In an interview with Hungary Today, Gabor Vona, the leader of the extreme rightist party “Jobbik” claims to be moderate, and not to be against Jews and Rroma. This interview goes against many other speeches where he or other people from his party advocated the eradication of all Rroma, requesting Jews to leave, and so on. In the interview, he belittles the impact of the guard, a paramilitary arm of Jobbik that marches through Rroma communities and even Jewish neighbourhoods with raised Nazi salute.

This interview doesn’t at all reflect the true nature of the party nor the actual policies they try to enforce, for example by removing Rroma from neighbourhoods, as in Nyiregyhaza.

News Osteuropa News Westeuropa Rumänien

31.12.2014 Migrant Rroma Abuse Welfare

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Another Rrom is presented in the UK Press as abusing social welfare and building himself a “mansion” for 60 thousand pounds that he managed to get from the UK. Looking at the picture of the afore said mansion, one can doubt whether the story is actually true, as in Romania, houses of this type are certainly cheaper than this.

In addition, this article perpetuates a view that all Rroma are poor, are poverty migrants, and as such, abuse our “generous” western welfare. This is far from being the case, as even in the UK, there are many invisible and integrated Rroma who do not fit this pattern.

Last but not least, the use of “Roma Gypsy” clearly shows the lack of knowledge and intellect of the journalist who wrote these words.

Deutschland News Osteuropa News Westeuropa Serbien

31.12.2014 Serbia as Safe Country: Gall goes …

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Südwest Presse reports on the visit of Reinhold Gall, Interior Minister and SPD party member to Serbia following the declaration of Serbia as being a safe country. According to Gall, following his visit, no refugee is being sent back into the “void” as stated by critiques of this move.

During his visit, he spoke to Osman Balic, the president of the Liga Roma, a Roma NGO in Serbia. According to Balic, Rroma would go to Germany for economical reasons and Gall concludes that there are no real reasons for political asylum for Rroma from that country.

We would like to remind him that this is a bit like travelling to the Southern United States prior to the session war, and stating that no, there are really no reasons why black would want to leave. While not that extreme in Serbia, there is an extreme segregation that has increased a lot due to the nationalism of the Milosevic years. And while one cannot say that all Rrom from Serbia should get asylum, there is not yet a real good reason to declare that all are safe there.

Frankreich Deutschland News Osteuropa News Westeuropa Rumänien

05.12.2014 Prosecutor of Paris: criminal court not competent to judge Manuel Valls

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Libération (2014) reports on a recent decision of the Paris prosecutor. The investigation covers statements by Prime Minister Manuel Valls, in which he claimed that Rroma had the inclination to stay in Romania or to return there, and they had a very different lifestyle than the French, which was inevitably in confrontation with the French one. The Paris prosecutor’s office now judged on December the second that the criminal court was not competent to judge the statements made by Manuel Valls. The criminal chamber will pronounce its verdict in this regard on December the 19th. However, the plaintiff against Valls, the organisation “La Voix des Roms”, wants that his statements are not judged independently of his function as the then Interior Minister, but are recognised as demagoguery: “For the lawyer of Manuel Valls, Mr. Georges Holleaux, the statements of his client are adjacent to “his ministerial competence”. In his view, the facts thus reverse the Court of Justice of the Republic (CJR), the only institution empowered to judge members of the government, for deeds which they have committed in the function of their office. Moreover, he pointed out that that Mrap (Mouvement contre le racisme et pour l’amitié entre les peuples) had filed a lawsuit against Manuel Valls at the the Court of Justice of the Republic in September 2013, which was dropped it without further consequences.” Manuel Valls is not an isolated case with his racist remarks against the Rroma. In recent years, numerous French mayors and politicians have gained public attention with racist remarks about Rroma. Some were sentenced to mild fines, others were completely acquitted, referring to the freedom of expression. In the French public, Rroma are equated with 15,000 to 20,000 Rroma who live in illegal settlements. The 100,000 to 500,000 Rroma who are integrated in France since generations, are continuously ignored. The Rroma are also repeatedly exploited by various parties for political purposes and blamed for social ills that have their origins in society as a whole, and not in a single minority. Unfortunately, this scapegoat policy finds approval among a shocking number of people (compare L’Yonne Républicaine 2014).

Bulgarien Deutschland News Osteuropa News Westeuropa Rumänien

05.12.2014 “Roma does not equal poverty migration”

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Selke (2014) spoke with Prof. Max Matter, a Swiss folklorist, about his new publication “Nowhere Desired: Poverty migration from Central and Eastern Europe into the countries of the EU-15, with particular reference to members of the Roma minority”. In his book, Matter addresses the mixing of prejudices with ethnic ascriptions and political viewpoints. Many politicians and journalists used the term “poverty migration” as a synonym for the migration of poor Rroma to Western Europe. With the expansion of the free movement of persons to Romania and Bulgaria, one increasingly spoke about well educated Romanians and Bulgarians, who also migrate to Western Europe. However, opponents saw this argument as trivialising the real situation. In his publication, Matter tries to deconstruct reductionist ascriptions that portray Rroma as poor travelling beggars: Rroma are not a homogeneous mass, are mostly sedentary since centuries and have no kings. In addition, many other ethnic groups also migrate to Western Europe. The assertion of a “mass immigration into the German welfare system” is not supported by the facts: “According to the Institute for Employment Research, there are just over 500,000 people from Bulgaria and Romania in Germany. As I said, some have very good school and vocational qualifications. Many of them work. All of them counted together, they just constitute six per mil of the German population. Therefore, one can hardly speak of a mass immigration into the welfare system.” Matter also refers to the majority of well-integrated Rroma that have been living integrated in Western Europe since generation and speak the local languages. At a meeting of scientists and politicians on December the fist in Berlin, the majority of those present demanded a de-dramatization and objectification the debate on “poverty migration”: There is no widespread welfare fraud. The existing social problems are not the result of immigration, but problems already existing before. In addition, one should be cautious with the use of ethnic attributions (compare Bade 2014 MiGAZIN 2014).

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