Briefings
The Roma, Europe's pariahs
On Presseurop
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European Union: The Roma: Europe’s guilty conscience
8 April 201315724PresseuropDagens Nyheter -
Slovakia: ‘We can favour the Roma’
22 February 201375PresseuropSME -
Romania: Expelled Roma will keep coming back
18 September 201219221 Evenimentul zilei Bucharest -
France : Blue blood defends Gypsies
31 August 201224511 Libération Paris -
France: Job market partially opens to Romanians and Bulgarians
23 August 20122835PresseuropLe Monde -
France : New Roma deportations greeted by silence
13 August 201232123PresseuropLe Monde -
Ukraine: Roma flee to the “reservation”
5 July 20121892 Aktuálnĕ.cz Prague -
Minorities: Roma still on the margins
24 May 2012594PresseuropRomânia libera -
Switzerland: Anti-Roma front page provokes controversy
13 April 20122572Presseurop -
Roma: Bleak horizon
6 April 201246111 MO* Bruxelles -
Bulgaria: Collapse of a so-called social model
30 September 20111763 Trud Sofia -
Hungary: Roma hunting season set to continue
6 April 20113784 Le Monde Paris -
Poland: Restaurants not for Roms
27 January 2011213PresseuropGazeta Wyborcza -
Demographics: Romania 2050 will be Roma?
5 January 20113PresseuropGandul -
Romania: Disappearing EU Roma funds
12 November 2010PresseuropTrouw -
Minorities: My week as a gypsy
10 November 201012311 Adevărul Bucharest -
Integration: What happens to all the Roma funds?
13 October 201028PresseuropEvenimentul zilei -
Opinion : Roma must take control of their destiny
10 September 20101466 Revista 22 Bucharest -
Andalusia: New model home for the Roma
6 September 2010336 Tygodnik Powszechny Cracow -
Romania: Rich as a Rom
4 August 2010PresseuropAdevărul -
Denmark: Roma are Copenhagen's undesirables
6 July 2010PresseuropPolitiken -
Slovakia: Anti-Rom election campaign
5 May 2010PresseuropSME -
Editorial: Pariah nation
9 April 2010632Presseurop -
Czech Republic: Apartheid begins in the school
8 December 2009104 Respekt Prague -
Hungary: Forced integration for Roma?
27 October 200928 Heti Világgazdaság Budapest -
Slovakia: EU to fund anti-Roma patrols
26 August 2009PresseuropHospodářské Noviny -
Hungary: Dark secret of town's anti-Roma attacks
18 August 2009243 Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung Frankfurt -
Czech Republic: Arsonists arrested, national honour restored
14 August 2009PresseuropLidové noviny -
Minorities: Financial crisis misery for Roma people
10 August 2009Financial Times London -
Czech Republic: Roma reality show ends in Prague
4 August 2009PresseuropMladá Fronta DNES -
Portrait: Far from the madding crowd
21 July 200919 România libera Bucharest -
Hungary: Jobbik's anti-Roma crusade
15 June 2009633 Respekt Prague
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Romania: Expelled Roma will keep coming back
18 September 201219221 Evenimentul zilei Bucharest -
France: Job market partially opens to Romanians and Bulgarians
23 August 20122835PresseuropLe Monde -
France : New Roma deportations greeted by silence
13 August 201232123PresseuropLe Monde -
Opinion : Roma must take control of their destiny
10 September 20101466 Revista 22 Bucharest -
Roma Expulsion: European double standards
6 September 2010251PresseuropPresseurop -
Roma: Sarkozy is doing the right thing
6 September 201030119 The Independent London -
Press Review: European press thrashes France on Roma
26 August 2010782 Presseurop -
Roma: No end to hypocrisy from Paris and Brussels
26 August 201098 Sega Sofia -
Immigration: France joins the heavy gang
19 August 2010582 Le Monde Paris -
Germany: 12,000 Roma to be deported to Kosovo
29 July 2010PresseuropDer Freitag -
France / Romania: Roma in the firing line
28 July 2010701 La Croix Paris
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European Union: The Roma: Europe’s guilty conscience
8 April 201315724PresseuropDagens Nyheter -
Minorities: Roma still on the margins
24 May 2012594PresseuropRomânia libera -
Roma: Bleak horizon
6 April 201246111 MO* Bruxelles -
Romania: Disappearing EU Roma funds
12 November 2010PresseuropTrouw -
Integration: What happens to all the Roma funds?
13 October 201028PresseuropEvenimentul zilei -
Roma: Where are the millions in European aid going?
13 August 20103072 Le Monde Paris -
Editorial: Pariah nation
9 April 2010632Presseurop -
Human rights: Amnesty demands EU action for Roma
7 April 2010PresseuropAdevărul -
Discrimination: Roma and Africans not welcome
10 December 20092PresseuropIrish Examiner
While Paris is toughening up its policy on repatriating Roma back to Romania and Bulgaria, some of them are doing quite well out of it by heading back to France – notably from what they pocket for leaving France “voluntarily”.
A scion of affluent neighbourhoods, educated at an English public school and currently a law student, nothing predestined Louis de Gouyon Matignon for the presidency of an association that protects Gypsy culture. Yet, this grandson of a marquis has embraced the cause and the religion of the Manouche, French travellers.
Of all the minorities living in Ukraine, the Roma are perhaps the most impoverished. Many of them were driven from their camps on the eve of the Euro 2012 football championship and most live in slums on the fringes of large cities, in misery and indifference of the authorities and other inhabitants. A report.
In spite of the efforts made by NGOs and the distribution of EU funds, Europe’s main minority is no better off than it was 10 years ago. A lack of appropriate supervision in Brussels, the corruption of local leaders and the indifference of national governments are at the root of the problem.
The riots that rocked the village of Katounitsa and several cities across Bulgaria have not only marked a sudden upsurge in anti-Roma sentiment: an anthropologist argues that they are also a symptom of a sick society which has been unable to overcome the scourge of clientelism.
At a time when the EU has called on member states to make greater efforts to integrate Roma living on their territories, Viktor Orbán’s government, which currently holds the presidency of the European Union, continues to turn a blind eye to the ongoing campaign to intimidate "Gypsy criminals" conducted by far-right Magyar groups.
What’s life like for the Roma in Romania? To find out, an Adevărul journalist dressed up as a gypsy for a week. He didn’t experience any direct discrimination, just general contempt.
There is no doubt that France is wrong to deport members of a largely powerless minority from its territory, but a Romanian writer suggests the Rom community will have to give up the negative thinking that has made it vulnerable in Romania and elsewhere in the EU.
Marginalised in several countries, recently expelled in great numbers from France, the Roma enjoy a relatively safe haven in the south of Spain. Other European countries would do well to take a lesson from this example, notes the Polish weekly Tygodnik Powszechny.
The Hungarian press is heatedly debating what to do about Roma, the main perpetrators – and victims – of the recent crime wave in Hungary. Essayist Eszter Babarczy makes a modest proposal in the weekly HVG: put the kids in boarding school to help them make their way in Hungarian society.
In the seemingly law abiding town of Tatarszentgyörgy, prejuduces against the Roma communinty have spilled over into violence. It would seem that even the local police are complicit in attacks on families, which has prompted the national government to collaborate with the FBI to catch the perpetrators. But this is not an isolated example, the political trend suggests that anti-Roma racism is on the increase.
The Financial Times reports that the estimated 8m Roma in Europe have been particularly hard hit by the financial crisis. Already the most vulnerable economic group, this trend has not only increased their financial woes but also prompted hostility against them from various quarters.
Enamoured of a Gypsy woman and a countryside that reminds him of 19th-century novels, British writer and journalist William Blacker spends half the year living with Transylvanian peasants. Portrait of a man between two worlds.
In Hungary, far right party Jobbik won 15% of the vote and three seats at the European elections. A remarkable success, especially in the light of an election campaign that offered little more than aggressive anti-Roma rhetoric and virulent criticism of Hungary's national government.
As interior ministers from several EU states gather to discuss immigration in Paris, French president Nicolas Sarkozy's drive against illegal Roma settlement has been vilified at home and abroad. A British columnist takes his defence.
All Europe has its eyes on France as it “repatriates” Roma to Romania and Bulgaria, and most deplore what they are seeing.
The "humanitarian" repatriation of several hundred Roma from France to Romania and Bulgaria is "cynical and demagogical", insists Bulgarian editorialist Svetoslav Terziev. And worse yet, it offers nothing toward solving the problem of their eventual integration.
Nicolas Sarkozy has put France squarely in Europe's extremist camp with his new hardline stance on security and immigration. But other countries have found far less confrontational answers to the same problems
In the wake of a spate of violent incidents, the French president has announced his intention to attack “the problem of the behaviour of certain elements in the Rom and itinerant community,” recommending that foreign troublemakers be deported to their country of origin — a controversial policy in both France and Romania, which highlights the European dimension of this issue.
In light of the absence of progress on the issue of Roma integration, host countries and the countries of origin are continuing to bounce accusations and blame back and forth. Brussels, meanwhile, is exasperated by the fact that the projects it is financing are either advancing too slowly, or not at all. 



