[Congressional Record Volume 154, Number 69 (Tuesday, April 29, 2008)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E751]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                    TEACH ABOUT THE GENOCIDE OF ROMA

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                         HON. ALCEE L. HASTINGS

                               of florida

                    in the house of representatives

                        Tuesday, April 29, 2008

  Mr. HASTINGS of Florida. Madam Speaker, as Chairman of the Commission 
on Security and Cooperation in Europe, I closely monitor incidents of 
racism and intolerance in the OSCE region. Today, I rise to address the 
need to foster greater knowledge of the genocide of Roma. I am moved to 
do so by some recent developments in the Czech Republic.
  Too little is known, and too little is understood, about the genocide 
of Roma during World War II--and that ignorance manifests itself in 
many ways.
  Last year, a tape recording emerged of a local housing committee 
meeting in the town of Ostrava in the eastern part of the Czech 
Republic, On this tape recording was the voice of Senator Liana 
Janackova. who was serving as a local mayor at the time the recording 
was made. And on this tape recording, Senator Janackova is heard to 
say: ``Unfortunately, I am a racist. I disagree with the integration of 
Gypsies so that they would live across the area. Unfortunately, we have 
chosen the Bedriska (colony) and so they will stay there, with a high 
fence and with electricity.'' She was also heard to say that she had no 
place to move the Roma and would therefore like to dynamite them away.
  News reports say that the Senator has since apologized and called her 
remarks ``silly'' and explained that they were not directed against all 
Roma, just some Roma.
  Last week, this case was back in the news because the Czech Senate 
declined to lift Senator Janackova's immunity, a necessary step for 
prosecutors to charge her under the Czech Republic's laws that make 
defamation of a nation, ethnic group, race or faith a crime.
  There has already been considerable criticism of the Czech Senate's 
54 to 13 vote. According to news reports, those who voted against 
lifting Senator Janackova's immunity argued that she didn't make those 
remarks with a racist intent. Senator Janackova declared herself to be 
a racist and talked about dynamiting members of the Czech Republic's 
most persecuted minority, but they didn't think she had a racist 
intent. Frankly, I'm having a little trouble following that logic.
  The fact is, this case illustrates one of the many ways in which hate 
speech laws stray from their original purpose and, often, don't work 
the way they were intended.
  Now, I am not an advocate of hate speech laws as a means to address 
racism and intolerance. It is perhaps worth recalling that just a few 
years ago in the Czech Republic, a Romani woman cursed the wall that 
had been built in Usti nad Labem to separate Roma from non-Roma. In an 
extraordinary miscarriage of justice, she was convicted of hate speech 
for doing so. If not pardoned by Vaclav Havel, she would've gone to 
prison. And Romani activist Ondrej Gina was threatened with hate speech 
charges for saying his town was racist.
  From where I stand, there are just too many cases where people are 
charged under hate speech laws not because they have fomented racial 
hatred, but because they have offended the national or local 
government's political sensitivities.
  So I am not here to make the case for prosecuting people for the 
content of their speech, or to argue that Senator Janackova should go 
to jail for what she said. Instead, I rise today to recommend that 
Senator Janackova visit the Romani camp at Auschwitz.
  During World War II, Roma were targeted for death by the Nazis based 
on their ethnicity. At least 23,000 Roma were brought to Auschwitz--
including many from the concentrations camps at Lety and Hodonin. 
Almost all of them perished in the gas chambers or from starvation. 
exhaustion, or disease. Some Ronia also died at the hands of sadistic 
SS doctors, like Joseph Mengele. In fact, a young Czech woman, Dina 
Babbitt-Gottlieb, also interned at Auschwitz, was forced to paint 
portraits of Roma for Mengele, who particularly liked to conduct 
gruesome medical experiments on Roma.
  On the night of August 2nd and 3rd, 1944, the order was given to 
liquidate the Romani camp at Auschwitz. In a single evening, 2,897 
Romani men, women and children were killed in gas chambers. In the end, 
almost the entire Romani population of the Czech lands was exterminated 
during the Nazi occupation.
  I don't know Senator Janackova. But I'd bet she has not been to the 
Romani camp at Auschwitz. Maybe she has not even been to the Museum of 
Roma Culture in Brno. Maybe she could view the collection of 
photographs of Czech Romani Holocaust victims that have been displayed 
in Prague. Maybe she could even help secure the resources to remove the 
pig farm from the site of the Lety concentration camp, as called for by 
many Romani activists and some government officials.
  So I'm not calling for Senator Janackova go to jail. But I would like 
it if she could visit the Romani camp at Auschwitz. I think she would 
learn a lot there--she might even learn that words can have real 
consequences.

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