Recent Romnews postings
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Date: Wed, 8 Dec 1999 08:59:34 +0200 (EET)
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Subject: Recent Romnews postings
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Recent Romnews postings
379 MURDERS COUNTED BY KFOR IN KOSOVO
Pristina / KOSOVO (RNN Correpondent) November the 29th, 1999
Since the marching in of the KFOR peace troops in Kosovo in June 1999,
at least 379 people have been murdered. KFOR identified 145 Albanians
and 135 Serbian's. Because of murder 51 persons are in prison at
present.
Serbian's and Albanians keep big weapon stores while the KFOR troops
are unable to stop violence and the increasing criminality. Unless the
UN police is ready for taking over, the ICG organization recommends
that KFOR continues performing these police tasks.
ICG also says that a more severe checking of the borders is essential.
The entry of Yugoslavian secret service agents into the Kosovo must be
prevented.
The "UN-Fl�chtlingshilfswerk" UNHCR complains about the border fee of
200 Mark per lorry that is charged by Macedonia. It impedes the
transport of goods into the country. The waiting time at the border is
presently 5 � 7 days. 56 lorries are waiting. This means that about
60.000 people cannot be provided for.
The Kosovo envoy warns of a grim winter. Humanitarian agencies in
Kosovo are in a race against time. Mr. McNamara, the Balkans special
envoy of the United Nations High Commission for Refugees said that aid
agencies are close to targets of getting 70% of homes ready for winter
with heating and adequate shelter. However, 47.000 homes are beyond
repair and there are big problems to provide basic facilities like
water and power.
Mr. McNamara said that 820.000 refugees have returned to Kosovo since
the end of the fighting in June. Those who have not returned to their
own homes are in temporary accommodation or with other families. He
said there was no one still living in the open under plastic.
However, more than 200.000 Serbian's and Roma have fled from the
war-torn province since the end of fighting. Although 800.000 refugees
returned to Kosovo there are another 200.000 refugees in Serbia and
Montenegro. "The refugee cycle has continued" Mr. McNamara added.
--------------
THE WAR IN KOSOVO IS NOT OVER
Kosovo (RNN Correspondent) December the 1st, 1999
The war in Kosovo is not over. Since June 18th the KLA and their
Albanian supporters have terrorizing the Kosovar Rom in an ethnic
cleansing operation hat has destroyed more than 20,000 Rom homes.
In many villages and towns, all Roma homes have been destroyed.
Families whose Roma ancestors arrived here as early as 1320, or
Hashkalija whose oral traditions recount an even older history, have
not only been made homeless, but over 150,000 have had to flee to
other countries.
In order to justify these attacks, the KLA and their supports have
labeled "all" Rom and Hashkalija as having collaborated with the
Serbs. Yet the evidence on the ground does not support this
allegation. Although KFOR and the UN police have received many
requests to detain Serbs suspected of atrocities during the war, no
Roma or Hashkalija has been mentioned in reports.
The ethnic Albanians dislike of Rom/Hashkalija goes back many years
before the war. When the Albanians first started to demonstrate back
in 1969 against Serb rule in Kosovo, the Rom/Hashkalija refused to
join this demonstration. While the Albanians wanted independence, the
Rom/Hashkalija were still too far down the economic scale to think of
that luxury. All they wanted were jobs and education. When they
finally achieved those two things under Tito, they were so grateful
they thought they were being patriotic Yugoslavians by not taking to
the street. The Albanians have resented the Roma/Hashkalija ever
since.
Although over 70% of Roma/Hashkalija had high educational degrees and
most of them held good jobs during the years preceding the war, the
Albanians today try to drag up the old stereotypes: lazy, dirty,
worthless, homeless.
Today about 40,000 Roma/Hashkalija are homeless, but only because
they're home has been burned since the arrival of KFOR. The typical
operation for cleansing a neighborhood of Roma has been for a couple
of local KLA
soldiers to accompany several Albanians to a Roma home and then
threaten the occupants with death if they were still living there the
next day. Usually the Roma occupants didn't wait, but left
immediately, many wearing only their pajamas. Their homes were then
burned. If the home was in a good area, the rubble was soon bulldozed
away and a new home built on the site for a local high-ranking
Albanian official.
Ironically, Roma who refused to give in to these threats and who did
not leave their homes usually were not attacked, and their home was
not burned - until now.
Now, today, with the disbanding of the KLA, a new wave of attacks is
taking place and Roma homes not destroyed in the first wave are being
burned.
The attacks are against all Roma and Hashkalija. No one is spared. Not
the retired, not the invalids, not the blind who of course could not
be labeled collaborators.
Although over 150,000 Roma and Hashkalija have fled Kosovo, their
ancestral homeland for the past seven hundred years, there are still
40,000 trying desperately to stay. But despite the UN's declaration of
preparing a multi-ethnic society and the claim of NATO and KFOR to
protect everyone, the results only point to a policy of genocide -
genocide of the Roma and Hashkaija today in Kosovo.
Roma today in Kosovo can not venture outside their own village without
being kidnapped or killed. Roma today in Kosovo are always turned down
by Albanian hospitals. Roma today in Kosovo can not attend Albanian
schools. Roma today in Kosovo have lost their jobs.
But perhaps worst of all, Rom today in Kosovo are being discriminated
against by the major aid agencies that are mainly run by local
Albanians. Since the war, over 90% of all Rom/Hashkalija communities
have been refused aid by agencies such as Mother Teresa, and
ironically by Islamic Relief, although all Roma and Hashkalija
remaining in Kosovo today are Muslim. Even an international aid agency
with a renowned reputation such as Oxfam has not escaped this
discrimination being practiced by its own local Albanians in Pristine.
But perhaps the worst offender of all is UNHCR. Their policy towards
the Roma they should be looking after can best be described by an
incident that happened a few weeks ago when UNHCR was asked how they
were preparing one of their displaced persons camps for the winter. At
a meeting attended by KFOR and Oxfam, the UNHCR director of the Rom
camp in question said: "We have no plans for them this winter. We just
hope they will disappear."
And disappearing they were until Macedonia closed their borders to
Roma and Hashkalija seeking to survive the draconian measures of UNHCR
in Kosovo.
At the main UNHCR displaced person's camp in Kosovo, just outside
Pristine, there have been four recorded deaths in the past few weeks
only because the UN police and the camp management refused to take
sick Roma children to hospital at night. In one incident, at 1:30 in
the morning, a UN policemen refused to take a pregnant woman to
hospital although her water had already broke and she was having
contractions every two minutes. He told the aid agency worker who was
on night duty that; "the gypsies have a tractor in camp. They can take
her on the tractor."
When local Albanians see the discrimination perpetrated by
international aid agencies and the UN organizations, why should the
Roma be respected those who won the war.
The war in Kosovo is supposedly over. But this winter more Roma and
Hashkalija may die than all the Serbs and Albanians during the war.
That is the situation today in Kosovo.
new pictures on http://www.RomNews.com
Theodor W. Fuendt for RNN
--------------
Skinheads Attack Roma
Prague / CZECH REP. (RNN Agency) November the 23rd, 1999
On Sunday evening in Budwar (Czech Republic) 30 Skinheads attacked
approximately 60 Roma during their private celebration, injuring six
Roma. On Monday the police arrested two men who participated in the
attack. Two days later, 600 Roma left the country to the United
Kingdom.
--------------
Filmmaker Melanie Spitta Wins Otto Pankok Prize
Luebeck / GERMANY (RNN Agency) December the 5th, 1999
The 20,000 Otto Pankok Prize was awarded for the first time to German
filmmaker and publicist Melanie Spitta for her lifework.
The Otto Pankok Prize is given by the Roma Foundation, which was
grounded in 1997 by G�nter Grass to foster tolerance towards the Roma
people. The prize is given in remembrance of Otto Pankok (1893 -
1966), whose work drew attention to ostracized minorities,
particularly Sinti-Roma. Pankok was Grass's teacher in the D�sseldorf
Art Academy.
In 1938 the Spitta family fled from the Nazis to Belgium, where
Melanie Spitta was born in 1946. Out of the thirty members in her
family, only six survived the Holocaust. From 1949 on Ms. Spitta grew
up in the Rhineland where she experienced discrimination by fellow
student and teachers.
Melanie Spitta worked togethor with the Munich filmmaker Katrin
Seybold. Togethor they have made four documentary films. She has also
published numerous essays in books, magazines, and has worked for
television and radio. She is currently working on a film, set in
1938, about the lives of two Sinti families.
--------------
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