GENERAL

Slovakia: Billboards humiliating Gypsies want removed

Hindus are dismayed at upcoming parliamentary election billboards in Slovakia reportedly labeling Gypsies (Roma) as “parasites” and belittling them, and want their immediate removal.

Hindu statesman Rajan Zed, in a statement in Nevada (USA) today, said that these racist and anti-Roma billboards should not be acceptable in 21^st century Europe which boasted of its human rights record. 

Zed, who is President of Universal Society of Hinduism, argued that Roma maltreatment incidents had been reportedly frequently popping-up in Slovakia; like erection of a wall in Ostrovany to segregate Roma, attempts of turning Roma settlement in Veľká Lomnica into a tourist destination, reported continual segregation of Roma children in Slovakia schools, involuntary sterilization of Roma women in the past, etc.

Slovakia and Europe needed to improve the conditions of Roma who lived in medieval squalor in mud houses without running water, gas and sewage in 21^st century. Was this a part of the vision of post-Berlin Wall European Union, Rajan Zed asked.

Zed pointed out that it was shocking to see how inhumanely Europe was treating its about 15-million Roma brothers-sisters. It was clearly reprehensible, hazardous and immoral and a brazen failure of Europe to meet its international obligations. When it came to Roma, Europe frequently failed to implement its own laws distinctly mentioned in its own books.

Rajan Zed stated that apartheid conditions faced by Roma people were a social blight for Europe and the rest of the world as they reportedly regularly faced social exclusion, racism, substandard education, hostility, joblessness, rampant illness, inadequate housing, lower life expectancy, unrest, living on desperate margins, language barriers, stereotypes, mistrust, rights violations, discrimination, marginalization, appalling living conditions, prejudice, human rights abuse, racist slogans on Internet, etc.

Besides the absence of any serious efforts at their inclusion, Roma were being used as “punch bag” and blamed for the social ills of Europe and many politicians even exploited segregation to their political advantage. European neglect was trapping Roma in cycles of persecution and poverty. Roma issue should be one of the highest priorities of human rights agenda of Europe and world, thus reversing the history of persecution, Zed stressed.

Rajan Zed said that “Tatra Tiger”, one of the fastest growing economies and country of Juraj Jánošík; Slovakia should not continue staying apathetic and silent spectator ignoring Roma apartheid. It was moral obligation of Slovakia to take care of its most disadvantaged Roma population and stop human rights violations reportedly suffered by them. There are reportedly about 350,000 Roma in Slovakia. Ivan Gasparovic is President and Iveta Radicova is Prime Minister of Slovakia. 

References to Roma people in Europe, who are believed to have their roots in the Indian subcontinent, reportedly went as far back as ninth century CE.