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In the European Parliament resolution of 9 March 2011 on the Strategy on Roma inclusion (2010/2276 (INI)) P7_TA-PROV (2011)0092, the EP acknowledged the following:

“A. whereas a large proportion of Europe’s 10-12 million Roma – most of whom are EU citizens – have suffered systematic discrimination and therefore are struggling against an intolerable degree of social, cultural and economic exclusion as well as human rights violations, and experience severe stigmatization and discrimination in public and private life;

L. whereas non-discrimination – although indispensable- is still an inadequate answer to a history of structural discrimination affecting the Roma and whereas it is therefore necessary to complement and reinforce equality legislation and policies by addressing the specific needs of the Roma regarding the full respect, protection and promotion of fundamental rights, equality and non-discrimination, the full and non-discriminatory application of legislation, policies and mechanisms to monitor and sanction violations of the rights of Roma, as well as the fulfilment of and equal access to their specific human rights to employment, housing, culture, health-care, participation in public affairs, training, education and free movement by means of an EU-level strategy.

Q. whereas growing stigmatization of Roma and anti-Gypsyism in political discourse and general public are causes for concern, whereas the questionable repatriations and returns of Roma that have been taking place in several Member States have created fear and anxiety amongst the Roma population as well as worrying levels of racism and discrimination.”

This is the situation of the Roma; and in this context, a worrying trend has developed in Romania in the past years, that of high-level discriminatory speech especially targeting the Roma minority.

The igniting factor seems to have been various actions of the Italian and French authorities targeting Romanian Roma, starting with 2007, and which forced the Romanian authorities to have positions on the topic. [1] Not all cases though are in connection with the events in other EU countries. Here are some of the most relevant examples:

In May 2007, the Romanian President Basescu, in the context of going shopping and being followed by journalists, snatched the phone of a woman journalist. While driving away in his car, not realizing the phone was still recording, he told his wife “how aggressive this filthy gypsy was”. [2] The phone was returned, the recording retrieved and the statement made public.

In June 2007, then Prime Minister Tariceanu, at a party delegation meeting, declared that Romanian police officers will be detached to Italy to help the Italian police, apparently in fighting Roma criminality. Referring to the Roma ethnics in Italy, the PM stated: “these Roma commit all sorts of crimes possible, from robbery and prostitution to organized crime and drug trafficking”. [3]

On November 2nd,  2007, against the background of the situation of Romanian Roma in Italy, who were being the target of a media campaign, starting from the presumed rape and murder of an Italian woman by a Romanian man of Roma ethnicity (which also ignited fierce debates in Romania), the Conservative Party in Romania proposed that people who commit such crimes should not be allowed to leave the country. [4] Asked what he thought of the Conservative’s proposal, targeting those who commit the most serious crimes, not the Roma, but against a background where national debates were  mainly going around the Roma ethnicity component, Minister of Foreign Affairs at the time, Adrian Cioroianu, declared: ‘Please believe me. I have also been thinking for days what the situation could be. I tell you openly that this does not seem to be the best solution to me, to not allow them to leave (…). This should be, how should I put it, the easiest punishment. These people who, (…) commit such crimes, these people must not be sent to a prison cell regime, with a TV, and with (…) they should be put to the harshest labour and formed probably those disciplinary battalions (...) I was thinking that maybe we could buy some land in that Egyptian desert, to put there those who….such people make a fool of us’. [5]

On November 9^th, 2007, First-Vice-president of the National Liberal party declared during the electoral campaign, with regards to the incumbent President Basescu, supported by the Democrat-Liberal Party that: “I would sum up as follows who votes for Basescu: alcoholics, gypsies (…) prostitutes, probably, although I doubt that prostitutes will vote for Basescu, taking into account the way he looks…”[6]

In February 2010, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Teodor Baconschi speaking about Romanian citizens in France declared: "We have some physiological, natural problems of criminality amongst some Romanian communities, especially among the communities of Roma ethnic Romanian citizens". [7] Later on, the same month, speaking about an encounter he had had with Roma persons during his time as Presidential Adviser for President Basescu, he stated with regards to the Roma: “You can say whatever you want about them, except that they are imbeciles (…) these qualities must be refined, used, and they will thus become a social capital”. [8]

Also in February 2010, at a conference for the launch of an evaluation of the Romanian Roma Strategy, President Basescu declared with regards to the Roma: “Equally, I know how much reluctance there is in very many Roma families to send their children to school. And I’m not saying this out of stories, but from my own experience, and here, in the room, there are people who can confirm this (…) Let us be honest: we have a big image problem. Go to Paris, go to Oslo, go to Rome, go to Milan, the Roma minority is present at every corner, in front of every museum, and not to enter the museum. So, we either admit a double responsibility, of the state and of the minority, for a positive evolution of the minority, I assure you that all governmental and European projects are doomed to failure (…) I can tell you that another big problem is becoming evident, more serious. Due to the positive birth rate which exists in the Roma community, the problem of housing is getting more serious. More and more live at the outskirts of cities, in improvised shelters and illegal on top of it. We will not be able to continue endlessly with the idea that the state will have to, in the end, build houses for this category. (…) The big problem is in the lack of engagement of the whole community in progressing and in their lack of conviction that school is the key to future prosperity” [9]

In November 2010, President Basescu declared, in an official visit to Slovenia that: “I must tell you something essential – very many important politicians are making a confusion when it comes to the Roma. We cannot speak of all the Roma. Those we see going around Europe are nomadic Roma who come from Romania and other EU countries. Their cultural objective is to go from place to place. Romania has over one million integrated Roma, they are part of the Romanian society. What we have not managed is connected to the integration of nomadic Roma (…) [10] We have another problem which must be said and which makes the integration of nomadic Roma difficult – very few of them want to work. Many of them, traditionally, live off what they steal.” [11]

In September 2011, against the background of Netherlands’ and Finland’s opposition to Romania and Bulgaria’s entry into the Schengen area, the Romanian President, Traian Basescu declared: “Diplomacy has its limits. For example, you cannot tell to the Finn ‘no, it is not true, Gypsies were not in the centre of Helsinki and were not begging’ (…) What can diplomacy do when the government finds that the Gypsies are begging, begging aggressively, have started stealing trough busses, through; what can diplomacy do, because there you have the reaction of a public opinion and any Government firstly looks at the public opinion from its own country.” [12]

On March 5^th, in a televised show, Romanian Senator Dan Şova, speaking of the Romanian Holocaust, assumed the view of a historian stating that: “on the Romanian territory no Jew has had to suffer and this is due to Antonescu”. He also stated that “historical data show that in Iaşi, 24 citizens of Jewish origin were killed by soldiers from the German army, unfortunately” and that in the Iaşi massacre Romanians have not participated. [13] The “Elie Wiesel” National Institute for the Study of Holocaust in Romania reacted, expressing their indignation as to the negationist messages of the Senator. [14] The Senator stated in a press statement published on his blog that he regrets if his statements were wrongly understood in the sense that he would have denied the suffering of the Jewish people and the guilt of Romanian authorities; that the anti-Jewish policies of the Antonescu regime, and the Iasi Pogrom cannot be denied by anyone; but that: “What I have tried to underline in the show was that Romanians did not want these things, but the unfortunate historical events and the Nazi policy were those which determined these events.”[15] Romani CRISS and the Center for Monitoring and Combating Anti-Semitism filed a criminal complaint against the Senator [16] for the breach of Government Emergency Ordinance 31/2002 on the prohibition of organizations and symbols with a fascist, racist, or xenophobic character and the promotion of the cult of persons guilty of crime against peace and humanity. Furthermore, five months later, the current Pime Minister, leader of his party, Mr. Ponta, appointed Mr. Sova in his cabinet. The Jewish community protested, but to no avail so far. [17]

Romanian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Andrei Marga, declared during a TV talk show, when asked how he is going to solve the issue of the “scandal with the beggars in London”: “We have this problem. (…) In London there was a pretty embarrassing situation. There were recorded, at least by the British press, many Roma buying vodka, enjoying themselves and sitting on the clean streets of London for the passersby to see them.” The Minister continued explaining that social workers and police officers have been sent to support London authorities in order to keep the problem under control, adding: “It is understood that the London Olympics is now attracting, and many people, not only from Romania, from this level of the society, is heading towards London. Let us hope that we will be able to keep under control. Certainly, our concern is, if you like, very intense in this direction. Why? An accident, an incident in this area would endanger our effort, more persistent than ever, to close the Schengen file, to get access to other facilities, such as the American visas, etc., etc." [18]

It came as a first that during the 2012 actions of impeachment of President Băsescu, the drafters of the impeachment document though to also mention, among the reasons invoked: “repeated insults addressed to the Roma community”. [19] In responding to the accusations, with regards to this point, the President stated: “I would also like to make a final clarification connected to the assertions related to xenophobia. They have been sanctioned with a warning by state institutions and have never been sanctioned by a criminal court, although many times these have reached courts of law. I regret them, and I agree that such statements must not be made by any political man, and all the less by a head of state.” [20] The impeachment finally failed, and the President is currently back in office.

Some of these statements have been brough before the equality body and sanctioned, but not all, and some decisions of the equality body which sanctioned such speech have been attacked by the persons in question (including by the President) and thus some reversed in courts of law (the decisions of the equality body can be contested in a court of law). [21]

Sources:

1. See, for example, Peter Walker, “Italy’s Gypsies suffer discrimination and prospect of draconian curbs”, in The Guardian, 21.07.2008, available at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/jul/21/italy.race1 (Date of access: 06.03.2012) and BBC, Q&A: France Roma expulsions, 19.20.2010, available at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-11027288 (Date of access: 06.03.2012) as well as: Center for Legal Resources Press Release. The Roma between France, the European Commission and Romania, 06.09.2010, available in English at: http://www.crj.ro/EN/The-Roma-between-France-the-European-Commission-and-Romania-581/ (Date of access: 06.03.2012)
2. See recording of the incident at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pNqfgi53COA (06.03.2012) as well as Alina Neagu, “The verdict of the High Court of Cassation and Justice in the case ‘filthy gypsy’: Traian Basescu’s gesture is discriminatory, but does not represent a contravention” in Hotnews, 15.05.2008, available at: http://www.hotnews.ro/stiri-esential-3017895-video-verdictul-iccj-cazul-tiganca-imputita-gestul-lui-traian-basescu-este-discriminatoriu-dar-nu-reprezinta-contraventie.htm?cfym (Date of access: 06.03.2012)
3. Ziare.com, Romanian criminals in Italy will be caught with Romanian police officers, 01.07.2007, available at: http://www.ziare.com/nationala-romaniei/stiri-nationala-romaniei/infractorii-romani-din-italia-vor-fi-prinsi-cu-politisti-romani-101721 (Date of access: 06.03.2012)
4. Conservative Party Website, Interdictions for criminals to leave the country. The Proposal of the Conservative party might be discussed under an emergency procedure in the Parliament, 10.11.2007, available at: http://www.partidulconservator.ro/2007/11/interdictie-pentru-infractori-de-a-iesi-din-tara-propunerea-pc-ar-putea-fi-discutata-in-procedura-de-urgenta-in-parlament/ (Date of access: 29.02.2012)
5. ‘Stirea zilei’ Talk Show - moderator Gabriela Vranceanu Firea, on Antena3, 02.11.2007, phone intervention of the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mr. Adrian Cioroianu, and also: MailOnline, Romanian foreign minister criticized for saying citizens who commit crimes abroad should be sent to labour camps in the desert,  05.11.2007, available at: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-491886/Romanian-foreign-minister-criticised-saying-citizens-commit-crimes-abroad-sent-labour-camps-desert.html (Date of access: 06.03.2012)
6. Ziare.com, Ludovic Orban: Basescu is voted by alcoholics, gypsies and probably by prostitutes, 08.11.2009, available at: http://www.ziare.com/articole/orban+tigani+drogati+prostituate (Date of access: 06.03.2012)
7. Mediafax.ro, Baconschi: The word physiological was underlining the fact that the criminality rate is similar to other communities, 23.02.2010, available at: http://www.mediafax.ro/social/baconschi-cuvantul-fiziologica-sublinia-ca-rata-infractionalitatii-e-similara-altor-comunitati-5600317 (Date of access: 06.03.2012)
8. Mediafax.ro, Baconschi on the Roma: You can say anything you want about them, except that they are imbeciles, 23.02.2010, available at: http://www.mediafax.ro/social/baconschi-despre-romi-poti-sa-spui-despre-ei-ce-vrei-dar-nu-ca-sunt-imbecili-5600512 (Date of access: 06.03.2012)
9. Presidency.ro, Transcript of the Speech of the Romanian President, Traian Basescu, at the launching conference of the report on the National Strategy for the improvement of the situation of the Roma: “Voice of the community”, 22.02.2010, available at: http://www.presidency.ro/?_RID=det&tb=date&id=11883&_PRID=ag (Date of access: 06.03.2012)
10. One can no longer talk of a Roma nomadic life in Romania following forced settlement state policies especially during communism.
11. Mediafax.ro, Basescu: many of the nomadic Roma live off what they steal, 03.11.2010, available at: http://www.mediafax.ro/social/basescu-multi-dintre-romii-nomazi-in-mod-traditional-traiesc-din-ce-fura-7689349/ (Date of access: 06.03.2012)
12. Realitatea.net, Basescu on Schengen: Netherlands and Finland have had a non-European behaviour, 22.09.2011, available at: http://www.realitatea.net/basescu-despre-schengen-olanda-si-finlanda-au-avut-un-comportament-non-european_873078.html (Date of access: 06.03.2012)

13. Victor Cozmei, “Institutul Naţional pentru Studierea Holocaustului: Senatorul PSD Dan Şova face afirmaţii care neagă Holocaustul evreilor din România” [“The National Institute for the Study of the Holocaust: the SDP Senator Dan Şova makes assertions which deny the Holocaust of the Jews from Romania”] in Hotnews, 06.03.2012, available at:  06.03.2012, disponibil la: http://www.hotnews.ro/stiri-esential-11679974-video-institutul-national-pentru-studierea-holocaustului-senatorul-psd-dan-sova-face-afirmatii-care-neaga-holocaustul-evreilor-din-romania.htm (18.07.2012) - also contains the recording of the assertions quoted

14. “Elie Wiesel” National Institute for the Study of Holocaust in Romania, Press release, Dan Şova neagă Holocaustul [Dan Şova denies the Holocaust], 06.03.2012, available at: http://www.inshr-ew.ro/media/anunturi/comunicat-de-presa-dan-sova-neaga-holocaustul (accessed at: 17.07.2012)

15. Dan Şova Blog, Declaraţie de presă [Press statement], 06.03.2012, available at: http://blog.dansova.ro/?m=20120306 (accessed at 17.07.2012)

16. Romani CRISS and the Center for Monitoring and Combating Anti-Semitism in Romania, Press release, Plângere penală împotriva senatorului Dan Şova pentru negarea Holocaustului [Criminal complaint against the Senator Dan Şova for the denial of the Holocaust], 07.03.2012, available at: http://www.romanicriss.org/PDF/comunicat%20de%20presa%20plangere%20penala%20sova%20final%20%283%29.pdf (17.07.2012)

17. AFP & EJP, “Romanian Jews ‘in mourning’ after revisionist senator is appointed as parliamentary minister”, in European Jewish Press, 08.08.2012, available at: http://www.ejpress.org/article/60859 (accessed at: 29.08.2012)

18. The recording of the show Realitatea la Raport (Reality under review), moderated by Andreea Cretulescu and Adrian Cioroianu, from 17.05.2012, is available at: http://www.realitatea.net/realitatealaraport.html#emisiune17Mai2012-2130  (accessed at: 29.05.2012)

19. Request addressed to the presidents of the two Parliament Chambers on the impeachment of Romania’s President, Traian Băsescu, available at: http://www.politicaromaneasca.ro/files/image/grafica/suspendare200357223000.pdf (Date of access: 29.08.2012)

20. Realitatea.net, Regretul preşedintelui Traian Băsescu exprimat în parlament [The regret of President B[sescu expressed in Parliament], 06.07.2012, available at: http://www.realitatea.net/regretul-presedintelui-traian-basescu-exprimat-in-parlament_961635.html (accessed at: 29.08.2012)

21. See also press statements and comments of the Centre for Legal Resources and other NGOs on most of these declarations, available at: http://www.crj.ro/EN/CLR-condemns-the-scapegoating-mechanisms-employed-by-the-Romanian-President-against-the-Roma-894/; http://www.crj.ro/EN/The-Roma-between-France-the-European-Commission-and-Romania-581/ ; http://www.crj.ro/EN/The-Roma-from-criminals-out-of-physiological-causes-to-traditionally-criminals-racist-statements-continue-at-the-highest-level-in-Romania/ ; http://www.crj.ro/EN/The-revival-of-high-level-extremist-discourse-in-European-Romania/; http://www.crj.ro/EN/Diplomatic-speech-with-racist-content-Antidiscrimination-organizations-ask-the-minister-Baconschi-to-resign-/ ;  http://www.crj.ro/EN/News/The-Center-for-Legal-Resources-and-Romani-CRISS-condemn-the-racist-statements-of-MoFA-Andrei-Marga/ (Date of access: 09.07.2012)

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