By DAVID CRONIN – Inter Press Service – Brussels, Belgium, Nov. 13, 2008
A political ideology based on the desire to exterminate Roma Gypsies is emerging in many parts of Europe, a Brussels Conference has been told.
Following many violent attacks on Roma by skinheads and other extremists in Bulgaria, it was announced during last August that the far-right National Guard was being established in some European countries.
The “Anti-Gypsyism” is advocated by its leader in Bulgaria, Vladimir Rasate, can be compared to the anti-Semitism during 1930’s in Germany, according to Professor Michael Stewart, of Anthropology Faculty at the University College in London, England. “With the National Guard Party, the disposing of the Roma-Gypsies is seen as basis for a national renewal. This is a new phenomenon now after World War II in Europe that has not existed before. This is a real danger!”
Professor Stewart added: “When today senior European leaders publicly discuss “solutions to the Roma problem”, advocating the use of dynamite, electrified fences, mug shots, fingerprinting of all Gypsy men, women and children, and also deportations, historical parallels inadvertently come to mind!”
The hostility against Roma has been particularly acute in Italy, where the political parties in Prime Minister Berlusconi’s ruling coalition have openly proclaimed that all Gypsies are criminals. In May of this year, the Italian government introduced a “security package” which provided for dismantling of Roma Camps and automatic deportation of all Roma who cannot prove that they have a steady job. But the discrimination of hiring Gypsies is so great that practically most of them cannot find employment.
The outright hostility against Roma people in Italy and Bulgaria is “unrivaled by any other European country.” The conditions in these Roma camps are extremely in bad shape and unbelievable living conditions. Roman people constitute in Europe about 15 Million people and are the largest ethnic minority within the 27 countries comprising the European Union.
Livia Jaroka, a Hungarian member of the European Parliament of Roma-Gypsy origin, said that her people “suffer from extreme sub-Saharan Africa type of poverty”.
Gabriela Hrabanova, an official of the Czech
Ministry of Labour said: ”In many of the EU member states, there is
nothing going on at the local level, although in documents issued by
the EU it looks as if everything is great being done for the Roma
people.”
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