04.05.2001 / A round table discussion on the status and perspectives of Roma communities in Serbia and the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was jointly organized by the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) and the Project on Ethnic Relations in co-operation with the Foundation on Ethnic Relations. The round table was part of the ODIHR programme on Roma and the Stability Pact.
   The meeting was the first large-scale dialogue between Roma and representatives of the authorities of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and the Republic of Serbia. The conference had been preceded by a series of three regional meetings in January and February, also supported by the ODIHR.
   As a result of these meetings, Roma NGOs and political parties developed a draft common political platform. In this platform, Roma political parties and NGOs call for the acknowledgement of Roma as a “national minority” in a future law on national and ethnic minorities in Serbia and the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. Presently, Roma are refered to as an “ethnic minority”, a concept criticized by Roma representatives as discriminatory in relation to the status of other groups in the country and contradictory to recently developed international standards on protection of national and linguistic minorities.

    04.05.2001 / As part of the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) efforts to advance the political rights of Roma in the OSCE area, the Contact Point launched a programme on “Roma-to-Roma” assistance to further the development of civil society and NGO capacity building in Roma communities. 
   As a first measure, an expert from the Romani Centre for Social Intervention and Studies (Romania) assisted Roma associations in Moldova to assess the participation of Roma voters in the parlamentary elections on 25 February and to launch a series of round table meetings on policy making on Roma issues, to be held throughout 2001, in co-operation with local and national authorities and the support of the OSCE Mission to Moldova.

    04.05.2001 / The development of a platform of the Yugoslav Roma is the goal of a series of regional meetings, the first two of which were held in January organized by the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) with the participation of Roma political parties and NGOs and Serbian and Yugoslav authorities in Kovacica (Vojvodina) and Belgrade. The ODIHR Contact Point for Roma and Sinti Issues supports the drafting of the platform document and, as a next step, the creation of a working group of Roma experts to contribute to the preparation of the new Yugoslav and Serbian laws on national minorities.
   For many of the Roma participants –representing political parties, human rights group, humanitarian organizations and independent experts – the meetings provided a first opportunity to openly express their views. The process leading to the adoption of the new laws on national minorities makes it necessary for the Roma community to structure dialogue and co-operation among themselves and with other political actors in Yugoslavia. It is thus also contributing to the overall process of defining and articulating Roma interests within the democratisation process in the country, as well as to overcoming the fragmentation of the political landscape that has characterized the Roma community since the previous regime.
   The ODIHR Contact Point’s assistance to the development of the Roma platform is part of a new programme on Roma under the Stability Pact for South-eastern Europe. (OSCE Newsletter)

    04.05.2001 / An independent newspaper, Roma Times, has been founded in Macedonia. The newspaper hopes to become a daily, but is now published Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. The staff is made up of Roma and non-Gipsy Macedonians. According to founder Zoran Dimov, 60 percent of the articles are in Romani, 30 percent in Macedonian, and 10 percent in English. The newspaper will cover politics, culture, domestic and international news, but emphasize Roma-related issues. Plans are to distribute the paper throughout Europe as well as in Macedonia. Says Dimov, “We want the newspaper to reach every Roma family in Macedonia as well as wider in the world, that is, we want Roma Times to be a regular guest, if I can say so, in every Roma family”. No subscription fee or newsstand cost has been provided. Contact BTR Nacional, ul. “Lazar Licenovski” 31-b, 1000 Skopje, Macedonia, e-mail btr@osi.net.mk.

    06.04.2001 / The american gipsies have sent a letter to Laurie S.Wiseberg, Catherine Brémont and Sandra Aragón-Parriaux, people in authority in the United Nations,  claiming for more participation in the World Conference against the Racism. Next, we reproduce the text of the missive.

    06.04.2001 / A European network of parliamentarians, mayors and local councillors of Romaní origin was established at a meeting of elected Roma officials, organized by the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights and the Czech Ministry of Foreign Affairs and held in Prague.
   The meeting provided a first opportunity for the nearly 100 participants from mostly Central and Eastern European countries to exchange experience and discuss strategies to improve the participation of Romà in the political life of the countries they live in. With only five members of parliament, some 20 mayors and about 400 local councillors, the Romà are still vastly under-represented in public office across Europe, although they constitute significant minorities in many countries.
   It was also decided to institutionalize the discussion initiated by the meeting through the establishment of an expert working group, which was tasked with developing concrete guidelines to implement the recommendations. (By OSCE Newsletter)

    30.03.2001 / Last 6th of March have been published in the B.O.E. (official state gazette) an announcement of  allowances and  subsidies for the achievement of cooperation programs and social volunteer system in the charch of the tax appropiation of the natural person income tax (I. R. P. F.). If Gipsy community refer their projects before 14th of April, they can be beneficiary of 269.676.000 millions of pesetas of a whole budget of 8.989.200.000  billions. The subsidies are destined to labour and social insertion and to the promotion and support the development of gipsy women programs.
   Only non-guvernmental and social organizations, which are working over the whole nation and non-profit-making organizations can request these subsidies. This organizations must have a sufficient estructure to guarantee the fulfilment of the proposed objectives. General Management of Social Action, of Juvenile and Family, Evaluation Commission and General Secretary of Social Affairs of  Labour and Social Affairs Ministry of Spain assume responsibility for the evaluation of the projects.
   The labour insertion programs are destined for the gipsies without education. All the programas must include subjects in the areas of basic education, general and specialited labour training and complementary activities.
   The most vulnerable gipsy people are going to be the beneficiary of social insertion programs, mainly in the areas of education, housing and health. The social insertion programs and the promotion and development programs are destined to gipsy women. The subject of this programs are reading and writing, social skill and health education.

Akharipen mamui o ratsimos

Tumaro apelo bichalen ko kadala e-mail adresse: 
president@whitehouse.gov
www.senate.org
osce-cio@bmaa.gv.at

APELO:

   Avdive kana azikeras te hula ko nevo milenium e Roma an-i lumia sa pobut hulena k-e integraciaqe, thaj anglunipasqe procesoja. Pal-e pire romane zoralipe von keren buti lache tajsasqe thaj zivdipnasqe. Avere rigatar e Roma pale si marde, mudarde, manusha so nashena kotar buteder bimangipe thaj teroria so kerena upral olende e manusha thaj grupe, govementosqe interesoja thaj maripe.

   Sar egzamplo: (Kosovaqi kriza, Migracie, diskriminacia an-i Slovakija, Cheshko Republika, Bilachi situacija e Romengi ki Grecia, Italia, Hungaria, Romania...)

   Ko 10 decembro- dive palo manushikane chachipe bichalas amaro lil-apelo kaj savore sam jekh anglo sa e thema e avere manushenca, khoni vareko shaj te del duma kaj e manusha trubun te diken pe pal-i lengi religia, sociala, muj thaj politikaqo dikhipe.

   E Roma keren presia te ovel olen respekto thaj manushikane chachipe so si ande katar e lumiaqe institucie sar instrumento. E lumiaqe standardoja shaj oven lacho punkto kote ka kerelpe pachavipe thaj tolerancia, puterdo dialogo, hachariba maskhar Roma thaj thaj Na-Roma an-e thema kote 3ivdinen.

   E Roma thaj Na-Roma, aktivistoja, den zor keripasqe zivdipe, kote so ka respektirinen pe e manushikane Romane chachipa:

STOP e diskriminaciaqe thaj rasizmosqe upral e Roma!

Drom ko keripe lachi futura pachavindo thaj repesktirindo e historiaqe thaj kulturaqe barvalipa Romane!

Kharipen ka i tchalavipen katar le themutne europune
Per o pativ katar le hakaja bazutne katar le roma

    30.10.2000 / The opening ceremony of this international seminar, organized by Young Women For Minorities and Unión Romaní Mujer, will take place on Monday the 30th at 9:30 a.m. in Viznar's Youth Hostel, Granada (Spain). This training course seeks to assess and establish some quality criteria for future activities, thus updating methods and approaches of the participants. The aim of the seminar is to show the importance of such an assessment and their future projects.

    Objectives of the seminar:
    -Revise and assess the impact and the relevance of the activities and projects that WFM performs.
    -Define educational and social criteria to improve the quality of the work with women from minorities.
    -Establish priorities in training in WFM.
    -Offer a forum to interchange experiences and opinions about the situation of women from minorities in European countries.
    -Learn more about the situation and the reality of women from minorities in Spain and, more specifically, in Granada.

How to contact:
    Encarnación Santaella Torres
    Organization Coordinator from Unión Romaní Andalucía in Granada
    Telephone: +34 958 80 09 21 Mobile phone: 676 25 39 70
    Adress: C/ Callejón de San Cecilio, 5
    18010 GRANADA

    Nadia Banno Gomes
    Szep Ilonka, 8 2030 ERD, Hungary
    Fax: +36 23 37 43 56

    02.10.2000 / We deeply regret our silence, which has been too long. We know that there are many people who frequently come to our web pages in order to find out what happens in the gipsy community. Unfortunately, our apparent inactivity has deprives them of this information.
    However, the Romani Union has not stopped working a single day during all this time. Our activity has been permanent. We have developed our programmes non-stopped and according to the said timetables. Our publications have appeared punctually, but...
    Well, mates, the problem has been the computers, the cybernetics, the progress and all these things that apparently make easy the life of human beings, but that sometimes make it extremely difficult. This is our case. The people that were responsible for having our web page up-to-date are not working with us anymore. The ones who have rested here have not been able to use the needed tools so that what we wanted to tell you could not appear on your screens. That easy and that terrible.
    But we have solved this problem. The web page of the Romani Union, which has been the first gipsy web page in the internet, will fully work very soon providing serious, useful and up-to-date information to all the people interested in the gipsy cause.
    We want to apologize again for the delay and we hope it will no happen again.

    03.10.2000 / "GITANO", the film starred by Joaquín Cortés that has recently been on the Spanish cinemas, has been highly controversial. We have recieved a huge amount of complains from the gipsies all over Spain about the contents of this film that awfully damages the image, quite distorted already, that we have in a big part of the society of the "gadye".
    The young members of the Romani Union, using his independence and responsability, have made a press-release that we have widely spread among the Spanish social media.
    Any opinion about either the film or the press-release will be welcomed by both the Romani Union or the young members of our organization.