[Congressional Record Volume 158, Number 23 (Monday, February 13, 2012)]
[Senate]
[Page S562]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          ROMA BRIDGE BUILDING

  Mr. CARDIN. Mr. President, at the end of January, something 
remarkable happened: Slovak Deputy Prime Minister Rudolf Chmel made a 
positive statement about Roma. Saying something nice about Europe's 
largest ethnic minority may not seem newsworthy, but it is and here is 
why.
  The Deputy Prime Minister reacted to an escalation of anti-Roma 
rhetoric in the runup to Slovakia's March 10 parliamentary elections by 
calling on political parties not to play the ``Roma card.'' But more 
than that, he welcomed a landmark decision of the European Court on 
Human Rights holding that the sterilization of a Slovak Romani woman 
without her consent had been cruel and inhuman. He welcomed the 
findings of a Slovak court that concluded Romani children had been 
placed in segregated schools in eastern Slovakia. And he commended the 
human rights organization that had helped litigate both these cases.
  To say that statements like these are few and far between is an 
understatement. On the contrary, officials at the highest levels of 
government frequently perpetuate the worst bigotry against Roma.
  For example, after four perpetrators were convicted and sentenced for 
a racially motivated firebombing that left a Romani toddler burned over 
80 percent of her body, Czech President Vaclav Klaus wondered if their 
20-plus-year sentences were too harsh. Romanian Foreign Minister Teodor 
Baconschi suggested that Roma were ``physiologically'' disposed to 
crime. Last year, President Silvio Berlusconi warned the electorate of 
Milan to vote for his party lest their city become a ``Gypsyopolis.'' 
And French President Nicolas Sarkozy has explicated targeted Roma--from 
EU countries--for expulsion from France. The common thread in most of 
this rhetoric is the portrayal of Roma as inherently criminal.
  Nearly 20 years ago in the New York Times--Dec. 10, 1993--Vaclav 
Havel described the treatment of Roma as a litmus test for civil 
society. Today, Europe is still failing that test miserably. As 
Hungary's Minister for Social Inclusion Zolton Balog has argued, Roma 
are worse off today than they were under communism. While a small 
fraction of Roma have benefited from new opportunities, many more have 
been the absolute losers in the transition from the command-to-a market 
economy, and vast numbers live in a kind of poverty that the United 
Nations Development Programme described as more typically found in sub-
Saharan Africa than Europe. Endemic discrimination has propelled 
economic marginalization downward at an exponential pace, and the past 
20 years have been marked by outbreaks of hate crimes and mob violence 
against Roma that are on the rise again.
  In the current environment, those who play with anti-Roma rhetoric 
are playing with a combustible mix.
  In the near term, there is the real prospect that fueling prejudice 
against Roma will spark interethnic violence. Before Bulgaria's local 
elections last October, the extremist Ataka party parlayed an incident 
involving a Romani mafia boss into anti-Romani rioting in some 14 towns 
and cities. In the Czech Republic, the government has had to mount 
massive shows of law enforcement to keep anti-Roma mobs from 
degenerating into all-out pogroms; its worked so far, but at a huge 
cost.
  Significantly, Roma are not always standing by while the likes of the 
Hungarian Guard mass on their doorsteps; they have sometimes gathered 
sticks, shovels, scythes, and anything else handy in an old-school 
defense.
  Even without the prospect of violence, there is a longer term threat 
to many countries with larger Romani populations: if they fail to 
undertake meaningful integration of Roma, they will find their 
economies hollowed out from within. More than a decade ago, then-
Hungarian Minister of Education Zolton Pokorni said that one out of 
every three children starting school that year would be Romani. Some 
economic forecasts now suggest that by 2040, 40 percent of the labor 
force in Hungary will be Romani. A number of other countries face 
similar trajectories.
  A desperately impoverished, uneducated, and marginalized population 
will not serve as the backbone of a modern and thriving economy. But 
several studies have shown that the cost of investing in the 
integration of Roma--housing, education, and job training and the 
like--will be more than offset by gains in GNP and tax revenue. In 
order to undertake those integration policies, somebody has to build 
popular support for them. And that is where Mr. Chmel comes in.
  Until now, most popular discourse about Roma seems predicated on the 
ostrich-like belief that perhaps they can be made to go away. Few 
politicians have shown the courage and foresight to reframe public 
discourse in any way that acknowledges Europe's future will definitely 
include Roma. Mr. Chmel has taken an important step in that direction. 
I hope he will inspire others.

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