FUEN at seminar about European policies against anti-gypsyism

On behalf of the Federal Union of European Nationalities, FUEN advisor Frank de Boer attended the seminar “Which Steps Against Anti-Gypsyism” that took place in Brussels on Tuesday 15 November 2016. The seminar, hosted by the Open Society Foundations and Michael Roth, Minister of State for Europe at the German Federal Foreign Office, took place under the auspices of the European Commission High Level Group on combating racism, xenophobia and other forms of intolerance.

Anti-Gypsyism is a specific form of racism against the Roma that forms the root cause for the exclusion of and for human rights violations against Roma. This summer, an “Alliance Against Anti-Gypsyism”, of which FUEN is part, published a reference paper calling for a better understanding of this pervasive form of racism in order to develop more effective ways to combat it.

During the day, it was stressed again and again that the centuries of injustice and dehumanisation of Roma created a system in which Roma are systematically excluded from society.

Michael Roth, the German Minister of State for Europe underlined that Germany has a special responsibility: “That's why Roma people can count on us. I encourage you to raise your voice”, he said to the audience. Minister Roth calling for a chance to reform Roma strategies, and for more concrete measures and initiatives. "We should strengthen EU's role as a strong defender of human rights." The Italian Secretary of State for European Affairs Sandro Gozi said he wanted to cooperate with civil society: "Governments need inspiration and ideas from civil society to combat anti-Gypsyism."

Soraya Post, Member of the European Parliament from Sweden and herself a Roma, called for Europe-wide truth commission to expose the dark history of anti-Gypsyism and to recognise the Roma holocaust. Not doing so would be a denial of the dignity and life of our ancestors, she said, stressing that the dehumanisation of Roma is still going on. According to the former Human Rights Commissioner of the Council of Europe, Thomas Hammarberg is Anti-Gypsyism the root of the problem. Hammarberg also noticed that “until very recently, the EU searched for reasons in the ‘Roma social structure' instead of in dominant society.” Hammarberg: ”We need governments to take moral leadership. Germany is doing that. We need Roma representation everywhere.”

Romani Rose, the chairman of the Central Council of German Sinti and Roma (member of FUEN) thanked Thomas Hammarberg for always having taken a clear stand to sanction racism, and Michael Roth for promoting the common struggle against anti-Gypsyism on the European level. According to Romani Rose: “States have gained power through exclusion of our minority. Even though we have a 600 years’ history in our country. We have to ban anti-Gypsyism as much as we ban anti-Semitism on all political levels.” Unfortunately Roma (and Muslims) are still the most discriminated groups in Germany.

Ant-Gypsyism is often fueled by populist parties, and this should be sanctioned, according to the participants at the seminar. However, politicians of the mainstream parties often also are committing Anti-Gypsyism, and 70% of reported cases of it are carried out by state authorities. In two parallel roundtables, promising strategies against prejudice and hate in the media and practices in anti-bias education for state employees and multipliers were discussed.

Although the situation of the Roma sometimes seems to be an intractable problem, there is an increased awareness that not enough is done to tackle the real problems. By creating coalitions and cooperation between civil society and governments that recognise the urgency of the matter progress can be made to remove the barriers for genuine participation of the Roma in European society.

More information:
Programme of the seminar
FUEN joins Alliance Against Anti-Gypsyism (5 July 2016)