• Home /
• News /
• 2014 /
• April /
• “We ask for justice”: Europe’s failure to protect Roma from racist violence, Amnesty International, April 2014, pp. 40

“We ask for justice”: Europe’s failure to protect Roma from racist violence, Amnesty International, April 2014, pp. 40

01 April 2014

Around 10-12 million Roma live in Europe, many of whom live with the daily threat of police harassment, violent racist attacks and appalling living conditions, often lacking access to basic services such as water and sanitation. This report was published on International Roma Day and examines cases in the Czech Republic, France and Greece.

It finds there been a marked rise in the frequency of anti-Roma violence across Europe in the last few years and that the EU and its member states have failed to respond adequately to anti-Roma violence and to ensure their human rights:

“While generally condemning the most egregious examples of anti-Roma violence, national authorities have been reluctant to acknowledge the extent of the phenomenon and slow to combat it. More often than not, they have pandered to the prejudices fuelling anti-Roma violence by branding Roma as anti-social and unwelcome. For its part, the European Union has been reluctant to challenge member States on the systemic discrimination of Roma that is all too evident.”

The report makes a eleven recommendations to national governments and two to the European Commission which encourage them to eradicate the scourge of anti-Roma violence.

The report is available here.