Christine Sudbrock – Page 8

The new EU Roma Strategy and the fight against Antigypsyism in the Western Balkans

The new EU Roma Strategy and the fight against Antigypsyism in the Western Balkans

Despite limitation due to the pandemic of COVID 19, Roma Active Albania kept an active role in advocating for Roma inclusion in the Enlargement countries of the Western Balkans.

Combining distant working with field work, RAA coordinates the partners of the regional project “Romani Women, Power of Change in the Western Balkans and Turkey”, in following their national plans and providing information from the grassroots level to ERGO’s study on the impact of COVID 19 on Roma communities.

Thanks to the financial support of the European Union through the European Commission’s DG NEAR, RAA has been working jointly with its partners in the Western Balkans and Turkey to implement the components of the project “Romani Women, Power of Change in the Western Balkans and Turkey”. The last months focused on building synergies in regional advocacy in the context of the new EU Roma Strategy and the fight against antigypsyism.

RAA actively contributed to the organisation of the event “The new EU Roma Strategy and the fight against Antigypsyism in the Western Balkans”, which took place on 4 November 2020 via the Zoom platform.

This virtual conference addressed strategies and measures to combat antigypsyism and to strengthen Roma empowerment and participation in the Western Balkans in the context of the new “EU Roma strategic framework for equality, inclusion and participation” for 2020-2030. The conference brought together governments, international organizations and civil society representatives from all countries in the Western Balkan region.

The new EU Framework guides the commitment of EU Member States and defines the core policy for Roma equality, inclusion and participation in the accession and neighbourhood countries. A key priority of the new framework is to recognize and to fight antigypsyism as the root cause of discrimination and social exclusion. Combatting antigypsyism should be done in a combined approach as a stand-alone task and as cross-cutting issue in the priority areas education, employment, housing and basic services, health and poverty, and keeping a special focus on Roma Women empowerment.

Following this event, RAA participated in and coordinated three national virtual conferences on the same topic, addressing the realities and challenges in Kosovo, Serbia and Albania.

These conferences were organised by Roma Active Albania, ERGO Network and the Central Council of German Sinti and Roma, in partnership with the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Neighbourhood and Enlargement and with support of the European Union and German Federal Foreign Office.

Intercultural Achievement Award for Roma Active Albania

Intercultural Achievement Award for Roma Active Albania

ERGO Member Roma Active Albania won the recognition award in the Intercultural Achievement Award (IAA) 2020 organised by the Austrian Federal Ministry for European and International Affairs with the project “EU Award on Roma Integration 2019 – Unknown Heroes”. The project was organised in partnership with the European Commission, DG NEAR and supported by the European Union. Participation in different conferences and seminars, as well the work of the partners in the Western Balkans and Turkey have positioned Roma women as a key factor in scoring tangible results in the Roma integration agenda. The award have brought additional recognition to the wider area of women empowerment.

The project honors women who brought tangible impact for Roma integration and empowerment in the Western Balkans and Turkey and provided political leverage enriching the policy dialogue of Roma integration with the cross-cutting issue of women empowerment.

The project got recognition in a competition of 300 entries from 41 countries under the category “Recent events” and a certificate for the recognition was delivered to Roma Active Albania in the Austrian Embassy in Tirana.

Through this award steps such as by setting up and running non-profit organisations and community centres, combatting violence against women, fighting early marriages, facilitating women to access to their legal rights, etc. received the deserved recognition as a way of improving the integration of Roma minority by acting locally.

FAGIC events with Roma women

FAGIC events with Roma women

In November FAGIC organised two events focused on Roma women, as 25 November is the International Day to eradicate violence against women.

The first debate “Leisto thaj phanel: rights and dialogue against antigypsyism” revolve around the role of Roma women in the fight against antigypsyism and discrimination. Roma women’s rights risk to be perceived as secondary in general policies addressing antigypsyism, even though the achievement of equal rights for Roma women is crucial in the fight against antigypsyism itself.

You can watch the event in Spanish here.

The second event “Romija thaj gadche vakeripen kotar sastipen: Roma and non-Roma women talking about health” tackled the issue of health rights for women from minority groups, and in particular reproductive rights of Roma women and the importance of creating protocols to ensure no women health rights are violated because of difference in beliefs and culture.

You can watch it in Spanish here.

NSOP Training on Presentation and Communication Skills

NSOP Training on Presentation and Communication Skills

From 24-26 November 2020 the Regional Roma Education Youth Association (RROMA) held an online training on “Presentation and communication skills” in the framework of the project “New solutions to old problems – exchange of new approaches in the field of Roma integration” funded by Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway through the EEA and the Norwegian Regional Cooperation Grants Fund.

The workshop was attended by about 30 participants from all 11 partner organizations from Romania, Northern Macedonia, Lithuania, Hungary, Bulgaria, Albania, Slovakia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Turkey, Ukraine, Belgium and the Czech Republic.

The first day of the workshop focused on presentation skills, where we gained many new tips and tricks on how to best promote our work for Roma inclusion and the fight against anti-Gypsy, with our expert Dimitrij Mihajlovski.

The second day, November 25, was a day for communication and presentation skills training. With the help of the journalist Sunai Sabrioski participants have a chance to improve their communication skills – returning to the basics and understanding the key elements, understanding the importance maintaining an effective article / speech / exercise.

On the third day a meeting was held between the partner organizations where they exchanged views on how to use the previously acquired communication and presentation skills, as well as on the future plans provided by each partner organization for the realization of the project.

ERGO’s response to EC proposal for Joint Employment Report 2021

European Commission releases proposal for Joint Employment Report 2021 – What’s in it for Europe’s Roma?

On 18 November 2020, the European Commission published the draft Joint Employment Report, published this year separately from the Annual Sustainable Growth Strategy (ASGS), which was released in September (see ERGO Network’s reaction to it here).

This year’s disconnect between the ASGS and the draft Joint Employment Report means that the former was not underpinned by the latter, and that Europe’s priorities for a green, digital, sustainable and inclusive recovery were not guided by in the in-depth analysis of realities on the ground that the Report provides. The structure of the Joint Employment Report does not appear to have changed (as it was the case for the ASGS), as it continues to track Member State performance in the areas covered by the Employment Guidelines and by the Social Scoreboard of the European Pillar of Social Rights. The impact on the pandemic on the employment and social situation in Member States is equally included in detail throughout the Report, as well as the national measures aimed at mitigating it.

ERGO Network warmly welcomes the multiple explicit references to the European Roma in the draft Joint Employment Report, but laments that, once again, they are exclusively mentioned in relation to education (pages 61, 88, and 107). The Report highlights that “Roma inclusion in education is a challenge that could become more prominent as a result of the COVID-19 crisis”, that “Effective enforcement of legislative changes for Roma inclusion in mainstream education remains important”, and that “The NEET rate of Roma is much higher than that of the general population.” Travellers are also named once in the document, in the same section.

The focus on improving Roma access to quality and inclusive mainstream education is very welcome, particularly as it also refers to obstacles such as severe poverty and housing exclusion. ERGO Network shares the concerns related to the impact of the coronavirus pandemic, which has seen a large number of Roma children deprived of the possibility to access online education, which only contributes to widening the gap with the general population. The digital divide is equally mentioned, in what concerns lack of access to infrastructure (internet coverage, electricity), equipment (PC, tablets etc) and knowledge (digital skills).

While the importance of affirmative action is recognized as a useful approach for ensuring equal opportunities, the Report takes a strong stance against segregation, calling for active measures to prevent it, as well as additional financial and professional support. Measures include educational mediators, scholarships, after school activities, language courses, free public transport, access to early childhood education and care, setting up antisegregation working groups, combatting the placing of Roma children in special needs classes or schools. These are very positive steps, already recorded in a number of countries, very much in line with ERGO Network’s own position and recommendations on quality, inclusive, and desegregated education.

Despite the very positive content on combatting school segregation and improving Roma educational attainment and completion, all the above measures are one sided and refer exclusively to educational establishments, while no mention is made of wrap-around support for families, access to adequate income, support towards quality jobs, decent housing, other services. This is despite the Report’s own admission that “In all Member States, the poverty risk for children raised by a single parent or in families with more than 3 children or with a migrant or Roma background is two to three times higher than that of other children.”

Tackling structural problems like persistent poverty or rampant discrimination, does not seem to be a concern, nor is proposing an integrated approach to the multiple difficulties faced by Roma citizens in Europe. The EU Strategic Framework for Roma Equality, Inclusion, and Participation is not mentioned anywhere in the text, nor is its predecessor. The Report completely overlooks the fact that the Roma are overrepresented in unemployment and poverty rates and face significant obstacles in accessing adequate social protection and key services, such as affordable housing, or quality health- and long-term care, including childcare. The Report also contains no reference to the situation of ethnic minorities or combatting antigypsyism and racism.

Encouragingly, the Joint Employment Report contains a full paragraph supporting the participation and direct engagement of beneficiaries and their civil society organisations in the design and implementation of policies that concern them (page 122), which is also stipulated in Guideline 7 of the Employment Guidelines.

ERGO Network hopes that the new decade will bring closer alignment between the EU Roma Strategic Framework and the European Semester, in full synergy with delivery on the of the Sustainable Development Goals and the European Pillar of Social Rights, to ensure that Europe’s Roma are not left behind, particularly in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic and recovery.