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Nine OClock
Barroso: The situation of the Roma cannot be settled in Brussels
published in issue 4270 page 3 at 2008-09-17
The dramatic situation of the Roma cannot be solved in Brussels, is the message transmitted yesterday, in Brussels, by the President of the European Commission, Jose Manuel Barroso, at the opening of the first European Summit dedicated to the Roma. Reason for which the EU official launched an appeal to the member states of the Union to offer “real chances” of integration to the members of the Roma community, whose situation is “dramatic,” and to fight discriminations.
Barroso cautioned that “the instruments for the creation of these changes are in the hands of the member states. Actually, the European Commissioner for labour, social affairs, equal chances, Vladimir Spidla, acknowledged at the press conference dedicated to the meeting that the European Executive does not have competences in this domain, the problem becoming the attribution of the national authorities.
Although the European Commission has recently approved the controversial census of the Roma from Italy, Barroso answered the messages of protest of the participants to the meeting against the measures taken by Berlusconi Government, stressing that the institution that he represents also denounces the ethnic discrimination. “The Commission has the same position, we reject any stigmatization in the European Union. Everyone must live free of any discrimination and persecution,” Barroso said, cheered by the audience.
Some of the Italian measures are the utilization of the DNA tests in the procedures for reunification of the family, fingerprinting and census in the camps of nomads, decisions justified by the Italian authorities through their concern to protect the children and send them to school.
These measures were severely criticized by George Soros, one of the main speakers, who was called a “Roma citizen” on this occasion by one of the representatives of the community. “I am very preoccupied by the registration of the Roma in Italy. I am afraid that this will become a norm de facto in the European Union,” he said in his address, a few minutes after Barroso, who had already left the meeting. “The registration on ethnic criteria should be illegal and hopefully this will be established by the European Court of Justice,” he said, in the ovations of the audience. Previously several associations for the defence of the human rights, among which Amnesty International, had criticized the European Commission for approving the census of the nomads initiated by the Italian Government, estimating that it issues in this way “a dangerous signal.”
“The Commissions seems to have adopted the narrowest possible vision, accepting a mild version of the measures applied initially by the Italian Government,” estimated a coalition of associations for the defence of the Roma rights. According to a report of the Council of Europe, up to 50 per cent of the Roma children do not finish primary school, and 50 per cent to 80 per cent of those going to schools in Central and Eastern Europe are directed towards “special schools” established in the ‘50s-‘60s for minors with learning disabilities.
EU does not have reliable statistics of the number of roma in EU
The European Commission does not have reliable data, comparable at European level, regarding the number of Roma who live in the Union, stated the European Commissioner Vladimir Spidla, in the answer sent to the Romanian MEP Ramona Manescu regarding the statistics concerning the Roma from various EU countries. Manescu requested EC information regarding the number of Roma who live in the European space and about the “level of European insertion of the Roma, in each EU member state.” Spidla said in his answer that “according to the surveys made under the UN programme for development and the Fund for the education of the Roma, the number of Roma reaches three-four million in the four countries in which they are the best represented, namely Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania and Slovakia. Nevertheless, reliable data, comparable at European level regarding the number of Roma who live in the European Union are not available.”
As for the possible sanctions against Italy for the measures taken against the Roma, Spidla avoided to give a clear answer, estimating that in this case there is not a large scale policy like that which exists in South Africa, “but only certain discrimination phenomena.”
by Nine oClock
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Galerie Foto
Actiuni PNL
Conferinta Strategia UE pentru Dunare
Ramona Manescu si Marius Lacatus
Promovarea Bucurestiului in PE
Lansarea Scolii Romano-Finlandeze
Ramona Manescu si Familia |
