Roma and Travelers in Netherlands fear for their culture

ZWOLLE, the Netherlands – For Roma and Traveler communities in the Netherlands, things were meant to get better.

Across the Continent, Europe’s largest minority group faces restrictions on their way of life, in particular their tradition of living in caravans. In July last year, the Dutch interior ministry set out to protect their rights by asking local authorities to halt the practice of limiting parking sites for their caravans.

Over 70 Years Ago, Nazis Victimized This Community. They Still Struggle For Acceptance.

BERLIN ― They were demeaned, stripped of their rights, forced into labor, sent to extermination camps, murdered. Theirs is a story of the Holocaust that often goes untold, and even so many years later, this community remains socially marginalized.

The Roma, also known as Gypsies, a term some consider insulting, are believed to have come from India to Europe between the 8th and 10th centuries. Before the Second World War, it is estimated that there were nearly 1 million of them in Europe. The precise number who perished during the Holocaust remains unknown, but historians say about a quarter of the European Roma population was murdered by Germans and their allies, while the Council of Sinti and Roma suggest the figure is about half a million.

Roma refugees victims of systemic discrimination in Canada, new report finds

Hungarian Roma who came to Canada claiming refugee status encountered unfair treatment by lawyers, politicians and government officials, according to a new study prepared by a team of legal researchers in Toronto.

The report, entitled No Refuge: Hungarian Romani Refugee Claimants in Canada, is being released later today by a group refugee law experts from Osgoode Hall Law School at York University. The group examined more than 11,000 refugee claimants in Canada between 2008 and 2012 and found that only 8.6 per cent of those claims were successful while more than half were abandoned or withdrawn.

Roma family fights against deportation to Hungary

After enduring anti-Roma discrimination and violence in Hungary, a Roma family has fled the country with hopes to settle in Canada. The family is asking the Canadian government to respond to their immigration application for stay on humanitarian grounds before their deportation date on Thursday July 3. 

A statement released on Monday said that Renata Buzas, Tibor Buzas and their three children applied for permanent residence on humanitarian grounds in December 2013, after their refugee claim was refused. The Canadian government has designated Hungary as safe for refugees, meaning that the Buzas family was not eligible for appeal on their refugee claim.

Roma refugee families hang 'Roma Are Not Bogus Refugees' banner

Roma refugee families in Parkdale, Ontario hung a 40 feet x 20 feet banner off a pedestrian bridge atop the Gardiner expressway at 7:00 a.m. on December 18, 2013, International Migrants Day 2013, insisting "Romas Are Not Bogus Refugees." Actions are taking place around the world.

"Romas are not bogus refugees, our families deserve immigration status in Canada rather than be deported to places like Hungary where our lives are at risk," says Robert Jano. "The Roma people have faced immense pain and persecution for hundreds of years. This tradition continues to be carried out by the Canadian government when they deport us."

The Myth of the Child-Stealing Roma

On October 21 in Dublin, an anonymous Facebook poster tipped off a news channel about a blond-haired, blue-eyed child living with a dark-skinned Roma family. The journalists alerted the police, who raided the home and took the 7-year-old girl away on a hunch—that hunch being the blood libel that Roma steal kids. The next day, seventy-five miles away in Athlone, a 2-year-old boy was removed from his Roma parents in similar circumstances. DNA tests proved both hunches wrong. Rumor and racism had taken the place of policing and journalism, resulting in immense trauma for both families.

Roma refugees should be welcomed, not rebuffed

If there are bogus refugees in Canada, the Roma aren’t likely to be among them. The latest evidence comes from a report by the United Nations Children’s Fund. It states that the Roma are at great and growing risk in the European countries of their birth. Their rights are being systematically violated through deliberate neglect and persecution.

They aren’t being killed outright, but extreme poverty, social marginalization and countless other forms of discrimination condemn many to a slow death.

How to provoke race hatred: On the Roma, Sun TV and the responsibility of broadcasters

The documentary that bears the lurid title 'Gypsy Child Thieves' was written and directed by Liviu Tipurita and released in 2009.

From its title you would think it was a piece of extreme right, racist propaganda.

The filmmaker did not have racist intentions, however.

Safe country? World Jewish Congress fears Hungary will relive 'darkest era in European history'

On Saturday, the former chief executive of the Canadian Jewish Congress, Bernie Farber, tweeted: "Large anti-Semitic rally in Hungary by Fascist, Jobbik Party. Same Hungary that Immigration Min Kenny says is a safe country."

Hungary's rising and increasingly powerful extreme right Jobbik Party organized the rally to coincide with the World Jewish Congress (WJC) holding its plenary assembly in Budapest.

The Conservative Hungarian governing Party, Fidesz, headed by Prime Minister Victor Orban, formally disassociates itself from Jobbik's extremism.

Romanians Guilty Of Causing 'Crime Wave' In London, Says MP

Conservative MP Philip Hollobone has said one of the key reasons Romanians should be prevented from moving to the UK because of the number that commit crimes.

"There is currently a crime wave of bag snatchers and pickpockets on London underground," he said. "Eight out of 10 pickpockets on the London underground are Romanian."

The Kettering MP, who is a special constable, made the comments during a parliamentary debate on Romanian and Bulgarian immigration on Monday evening that had been triggered by people signing an e-petition on the subject.

Trading away human rights? Canada turns a blind eye toward abuses against Roma in EU

Barely a week goes by when the Conservative government does not issue at least one press release touting the value of a Canada-European Union (EU) trade deal.

Last week Trade Minister Ed Fast told British Columbians that such a deal would "eliminate tariffs, including those on key provincial exports such as forest products, metals and minerals, fish and seafood, agriculture and agri-food products, and services."

The week before, the Minister told Quebeckers that a trade deal with the EU would benefit that province's chemical and aluminum industries.

Sorry for anti-Roma rant? As It Happens interviewer demolishes Sun News VP

If you think Sun News Network is bad now, just wait until they've got their ruling from th
e Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission that their broadcasts must be carried on basic cable television and paid for by cable subscribers.

Any listener could infer they'll be much worse after listening yesterday evening to CBC interviewer Carol Off demolish Sun News Network Vice-President Kory Teneycke's slippery attempt to defend the far-right network's commentator Ezra Levant for his racist diatribe against the Roma people six months ago.

The story behind Ezra Levant's 11th hour 'apology' for Roma rant

Apologies are coming fast and furious from Ezra Levant and Sun News Network. Just this week, there have been apologies for comments made about the publication Vancouver Observer and for a rant directed against the Roma people. Our parliamentary reporter Karl Nerenberg, who has been closely following the story of Roma refugees in Canada, has uncovered information about just how close Levant actually came to facing prosecution for hate crimes over his comments about the Roma. The office of the Attorney General of Ontario was contacted for comment on this story, but did not reply by deadline.

And so, Sun News' resident bad boy and low-rent, ersatz Rush Limbaugh, Ezra Levant, has apologized.

Hungary's right-wing inflames ethnic tensions

In a cafe in Budapest's 8th District, known for its high population of Roma - also known as Gypsies - Hungarian activist Jeno Setét spoke about the discrimination he says his community faces on a regular basis.

He described how he and his wife, a non-Roma, were applying to live in an apartment. The owner initially thought Setét's wife would be the only renter - but when he found out that Setét, a Roma, would also be living there, the couple was immediately told they could not take the apartment.

Canadian government to persecuted Roma people in Hungary: 'Stay home'

Early in January of this year, Zsolt Bayer, a founder of Hungary's ruling Fidesz Party and a confidant of Hungary's current Prime Minister, told a journalist: “Most Gypsies are not suitable for cohabitation. They are not suitable for being among people. Most are animals, and behave like animals. They shouldn't be tolerated or understood, but stamped out. Animals should not exist. In no way."

 That hateful screed engendered some pushback. There were calls from Hungary's beleaguered opposition forces for Prime Minister Victor Orban to strip his old friend of his Party membership and condemn what was, almost literally, a call to genocide.

Anti-Roma article by Hungarian politician sparks outrage

BUDAPEST, HUNGARY—A founding member of Hungary’s governing Fidesz party has been sharply criticized for writing a newspaper column that contained offensive remarks about the nation’s Roma minority.

Writing about a New Year’s Eve bar fight in which several people were seriously injured and some of the attackers were reportedly Roma, the journalist Zsolt Bayer said “a significant part of the Roma are unfit for coexistence. They are not fit to live among people. These Roma are animals and they behave like animals.”

It's time for Ezra Levant to apologize or explain his hateful Roma commentary

It's 2013, and it's time for Sun News Network commentator Ezra Levant to either apologize for or explain his comments on Sept. 5, 2012, about the Roma.

Now, Levant appears to be the kind of young man for whom a phrase like "never apologize, never explain," would take on mantra-like authority. Nevertheless, it's time, or certain conclusions about Levant's views about the Roma people will be impossible to avoid.

Jason Kenney expresses 'solidarity' with the Roma, but designates Hungary a 'safe' country

The 1950s comedy 'Some Like it Hot' ends with the hilarious line: "Nobody’s perfect!"

That happens when millionaire Osgood Fielding III (played by the very funny Joe. E. Brown) discovers the woman to whom he has just proposed marriage is, in fact, Jack Lemmon in (barely convincing) drag!

Well Canada's Immigration Minister is no Jack Lemmon (or Marilyn Monroe) but "nobody's perfect" was almost the main theme of his news conference on Friday.

Hungarian Roma hope for sanctuary in Canada

In an old photo of the band Romanyi Roma, the group’s members seem to have at least two things going for them: optimism and youth.

Dancer and singer Ildiko Balogh still has the same innocent-looking face, but in the picture, her hair is darker. (It’s now bleached blond.) In the image, her husband, guitar player and lead vocalist Ferenc Balogh, has a moustache and a significant amount of hair, but probably no inkling of the heart disease that, later in life, would often leave him winded and ashen-faced.

First they demonized the Roma, but I did not speak out because I was not Roma

First they demonized the Roma, but I did not speak out because I was not Roma ...

Martin Niemöller was a German Lutheran pastor who came of age in the first part of the 20th Century and who, when it first came to power, supported Hitler's regime.

At that time, Niemöller was, in the words of one historian, a "typical Christian anti-semite who openly professed his belief that the Jews had been punished through the ages because they had 'brought the Christ of God to the cross.'"