Tag: War in Ukraine

Monitoring Mission on the situation of Ukrainian Roma refugees in Moldova

On 30-31 January Ukraine coordinator Dejan Markovic and Communication and Campaigns officer Ana Rozanova from the ERGO Network Secretariat together with our partners and associate members from Foundation Jaw Dikh in Poland went on a monitoring mission to Moldova. We were hosted by our local partner Roma Women Platform ROMNI and aimed to better understand the country’s situation regarding the Roma refugees from Ukraine: the national policies, the living conditions of refugees, the support they get from the state, the registration process, and other important factors.

According to unofficial sources, there are currently 5000 Roma refugees from Ukraine in Moldova and an additional 2000 in the region of Transnistria, making it one of the key countries for our monitoring and humanitarian support. A significant number of refugees in the country are not registered, limiting them in the services they receive and their families’ mobility. Because of these and other factors, we have chosen Moldova as the destination for this second monitoring mission of our one-year-long project supported by the European Programme for Integration and Migration (EPIM).

Roma Women Platform “Romni”

Our partner in Roma Women Platform “Romni” is supporting the arriving Roma refugees from Ukraine since the beginning of the war in February 2022. Despite the small size of the organisation, they have efficiently organised the work and were able to provide humanitarian aid thanks to partnerships with not only ERGO Network, but also the UN agencies, Oxfam, MADRE grants and other donors.

They have carried out the first basic monitoring of the locations of refugees (often unregistered), their demographics and the main needs they face, putting together detailed lists of humanitarian aid needs for the donors to maximise the clearly insufficient support for the number of people in need.

“Romni” has also been a part of the informal Roma civil society coalition which pushed for establishing a position in the government crisis response group (presently the Crisis Centre for Refugees under the Ministry of Interior) who would be advocating specifically for the Roma refugees. As the director of “Romni” Elena Sirbu is an established journalist, her organisation was active in communicating the issues refugees face both on national and international level and also runs several media projects, raising awareness among the arriving refugees themselves through leaflets and a Youtube channel in 5 main dialects of Romanes.

Visiting Ukrainian Roma refugees

We started our mission by visiting the Roma Refugees Center “Testimiţeanu 6” in Chișinău. This centre was established in March 2022 and is currently hosting approximately 115 people, the majority of them Roma from the Odesa region. Although the living conditions have improved in comparison to the first centre for Ukrainian refugees set up in the “Manej” athletics centre of Chișinău, it still lacks showers (currently only one is functional), and the rooms are crowded, with often 6-8 or more people in one room.

We had a chance to speak with several families living in the centre about their main problems – unfortunately, many. While all the inhabitants of the centre spoke of their gratitude to be able to stay in a safe country and be provided with meals and a roof above their heads, several issues could be improved.

The meals provided in the centre by the catering company are one-dish-fits-all: often it is not suitable for very young children or older people staying in the centre. When the meal contains pork, it also cannot be eaten by the Muslim inhabitants of the centre (mostly of Azerbaijani origin). The children of the centre have a chance to go to school, but the school is located relatively far away, only accessible by two consequent means of transport, which is lengthy and costly. The medicine provided to the inhabitants is only the most basic one, covering urgent needs, but does not include the medicine for less acute but still very pressing health problems.

We followed this by visiting several Roma families from Ukraine who stay in private accommodations. While this housing option gives families more privacy and likely more opportunities to feel better integrated into the country, it is also very expensive. As both rent and charges for heating, water, and electricity went up this winter, and at the same time the monthly subsistence payments granted by the UN agency were delayed for two months, many families from private accommodation had to leave it and return to the centres or are fearing that soon they will have to.

Meeting national stakeholders

On the second day of our visit, we met with Marin Alla from the Crisis Centre for Refugees under the Ministry of Interior of Moldova, who is the only Roma representative in the centre and is a strong ally of the refugees, trying to both understand their situation in depth and to push for solutions which would improve it.

A new form of temporary protection will be available for all Ukrainian refugees in Moldova from the beginning of March. This form would ensure more comprehensive protection and improved conditions for accessing medical and other services. This type of registration will also enable the schools in Moldova to cooperate with the schools in Ukraine and to receive the necessary data for the pupils to progress from the currently provided “auditioning” form of schooling to a full form of school education, which would be acknowledged in both Ukraine and Moldova.

However, this type of temporary protection would still not include any financial support to the refugees from the state and will additionally restrict their mobility. As we have learnt a day before, many refugees would still travel to Odesa to visit their homes and extended family, and to receive medical consultations from their doctors. The journey by regular bus takes only 3 hours.

The new temporary protection – the way it is currently formulated in the final draft form – only allows a refugee to leave Moldova for up to a total of 35 days per year. After this limit has been reached, the protection status is removed and cannot be applied for again. Therefore, this would limit the Odesa region’s refugees from visiting their homes as often as they would like.

Another national partner we met was Nicolae Rădiţa, Adviser for Human Rights and Interethnic Relations to the Prime Minister. In addition to the state policies concerning Ukrainian Roma refugees, we also discussed the current National Roma Programme 2022-2025, coordinated by the Agency for Interethnic Relations, and the needs of the local Roma population of Moldova. This is a country where until recently ERGO Network was not actively involved, but due to the newly established partnership, we hope to keep a closer eye on the situation.

We believe that we have left the country with a better understanding of the situation, which we knew mostly from reports before. A crucial role in this understanding was played by the fact that we met national partners, representatives of civil society, and importantly also many refugees themselves. We discussed the issues from different angles and with different actors involved, and we hope that we can now continue our work in Moldova with better-targeted and more in-depth measures.

Conclusions and Recommendations

We have seen that there are several main issues contributing to the generally problematic situation of the Ukrainian Roma refugees in Moldova.

While the state provides the refugees with a lack of financial support the state puts the refugees in a situation where they often lack money for covering their basic needs, such as food, medicine and transport to school for the children. The situation is even more precarious for the refugees who do not stay in the centres either by choice, but more often because of the circumstances: the payments they receive are so unstable that they ensure monthly payments for their rented accommodation.

ERGO Network would encourage the state authorities and national and international donors to better coordinate the financial help for refugees, to ensure they have access to the needed services and have a decent standard of living.

The state is preparing a registration for temporary protection, but the CSOs doubt whether this policy will make the life of particularly Ukrainian Roma refugees easier or put an extra burden on them. ERGO Networks welcomes the position of Marin Alla as responsible specifically for the Roma refugees and would encourage the authorities to keep this position for the full duration of the crisis, as well as to take into account his suggestion when it comes to drafting policies concerning the refugees.

We would further encourage the authorities to ensure that the refugees – even those lacking either literacy skills or technology or both – are able to register for temporary protection. The CSOs can assist them with this task, but for this, they would need to be supported by the state.

Antigypsyism also penetrates all the areas of refugee treatment, making the daily life of the already-vulnerable Roma refugee community even more complicated, and has to be first acknowledged, before it can be tackled on structural level.

A report will be prepared, which will provide ERGO Network and the partners with the necessary data to strengthen our advocacy and cooperation with possible allies. A similar mission has already taken place in the Czech Republic and others will also take place in the coming weeks in Hungary, Poland, and Slovakia.

 

Monitoring Mission on the situation of Ukrainian Roma refugees in the Czech Republic

On 26 October ERGO Network Secretariat together with our partners and members from Jaw Dikh Poland and Roma Women Platform ROMNI from Moldova held the first monitoring mission to investigate the situation of Ukrainian Roma refugees in the Czech Republic. This is the first mission of our one-year-long project supported by the European Programme for Integration and Migration (EPIM).

The organisations met with the Czech organisation Romodrom, which is active in the field of Roma refugee support since the onset of the war, currently working with more than 1500 people from Ukraine in the Czech Republic as well as also providing social services to the Roma in Western Ukraine.

 

The partners have discussed the work of Romodrom and other recipient countries. The partners from Jaw Dikh and ROMNI shared the practices from their work with mediators and service provision as well as advocacy and lobbying.

The meeting was followed by a visit to a refugee centre in Prague 5, where 90 people are accommodated, most of them Roma from Western Ukraine. Several organisations are contributing to the smooth functioning of the centre: Romodrom by covering the rent and taking care of the logistics, RomPraha provides social services, our members from Slovo 21 are offering cooking facilities and other classes, UNICEF runs after-school classes for children to help them adapt to the new environment.

A report will be prepared after more information is collected, which will provide ERGO Network and the partners with the necessary data to strengthen our advocacy and cooperation with possible allies. Similar visits will also take place in the coming months to Moldova, Poland, Romania and possibly Ukraine.

IRCG joint message on Roma refugees from Ukraine:

Joint Message and Recommendations

by participants of the International Roma Contact Group (IRCG) online meeting on Roma and Sinti populations in crisis situations with a focus on the ongoing conflict in Ukraine. The meeting was organised by the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (OSCE/ODIHR) on 31 May 2022 and brought together 16 Roma civil society representatives and activists.

During the meeting, participants identified the key challenges and concerns currently affecting Ukrainian Roma refugees in the light of the ongoing conflict in Ukraine. Participants put forward recommendations for action to OSCE participating States and other stakeholders to address the needs of Ukrainian Roma people.

IRCG joint message

·       Roma refugees from Ukraine encounter various forms of unequal treatment in their attempt to seek refuge in reception countries. Such treatment includes acts of discrimination in access to housing, employment, transportation, and exclusion from resources and services available to refugees. We cannot allow antigypsyism towards Roma refugees to be tolerated and perpetrated by authorities and volunteers in receiving countries. The various forms of alleged violations of international humanitarian, refugee and human rights law must be investigated and prosecuted, and the evacuation and protection of civilians, including minorities, Roma, and other marginalised groups, both within Ukraine and abroad, must be ensured in accordance with international standards.

·       Particular attention must be immediately paid to safeguarding the human rights of internally displaced Roma within Ukraine and the human rights of Roma refugees during border crossings into neighbouring countries and during travel to other countries to seek safe haven.

·       The labelling of Roma refugees as “economic migrants” or “social tourists” increases the likelihood that they could become targets of hate crime. Such language promotes general anti-Roma sentiment and can increase social tensions among all non-Roma and Roma. This creates a dangerous enabling environment for human rights violations to occur. The same thing happened to Roma escaping the Kosovo conflict 20 years ago and led to wide-scale rights violations. Discriminatory expressions of solidarity for refugees from Ukraine that exclude Roma must not be tolerated and must be sanctioned accordingly.

·       Security forces, those responsible for managing transportation systems, and those responsible for refugee intake procedures must instruct and strictly monitor their personnel. They must sanction any abuses that are committed by their employees against internally displaced Roma people or Roma refugees and must send a clear message that such abuses will not be tolerated.

·       Most interventions to help Roma are undertaken by Roma civil society organizations and activists themselves. This puts them under tremendous organizational, financial, social, and cultural pressure. In addition, while humanitarian aid in Ukraine is distributed by Roma and pro-Roma organizations, Roma communities that have no link with Roma civil society cannot receive any humanitarian support.

·       Interpretation services for internally displaced Roma people and Roma refugees, including those provided by amateur volunteers, must be provided by people who are first vetted for their commitment to the UNHCR’s basic principles of ethics for interpreting in asylum procedures.[1] Persons who refer to Roma using racial slurs and pejorative language, or who insert their personal bias into interactions, should not be allowed to interpret.

·       The health and safety of the children of internally displaced Roma people or Roma refugees as well as that of their caregivers must be prioritised by all agencies, international and national, including their accommodation in standard housing and their access to nutritionally appropriate food and medical care. Children and their caregivers must not be hosted in places that are too distant from access to goods and services and must never be ethnically segregated.

·       Roma communities who remain in Ukraine are at risk of hunger and illness as military operations cut off access to food, education, and medical supplies. Those who manage to escape the battlefields are at risk of family separation, violence, abuse, exploitation and human trafficking.

·       Many Roma families in Ukraine were and continue to be unable to cross the border because of lack of identification documents or birth certificates for children.

·       Roma children and their mothers who have moved from Ukraine to countries elsewhere in Europe in most cases remain without access to education, are isolated, and face substandard conditions in refugee reception centres.

·       Roma Holocaust survivors are in need of specific assistance and support and while some prefer to stay in Ukraine, others might be interested in being evacuated with close family members to a safe place.

Recommendations for OSCE participating States

·       To investigate and prosecute various forms of alleged violations of international humanitarian and human rights law, and to ensure the evacuation and protection of civilians, including minorities, Roma, and other marginalised groups, in accordance with international standards.

·       To ensure that the rights of internally displaced people and Roma refugees, including those holding dual citizenship or who are stateless, are respected and secured without discrimination, and that they have equal access to shelter, transportation, healthcare, humanitarian aid, employment opportunities and education.

·       To develop and put in place national mechanisms for monitoring the situation of Roma refugees in reception countries.

·       To encourage and facilitate the reporting of cases of discrimination, hate incidents and crimes, as well as other forms of intolerance toward Roma refugees, and to properly investigate such cases to ensure that they do not remain unsanctioned, and that effective compensation and counselling is provided to the victims.

·       To provide safe and adequate housing for both internally displaced Roma and Roma refugees, restricting the use of segregated and outdoor facilities such as camps and tents that meet bare minimum standards to short-term, temporary periods only, and to ensure that state-run accommodation facilities take into consideration large/extended families and their cultural habits and beliefs.

·       To ensure equal, non-discriminatory access by Roma refugees, including those holding dual citizenship and those who are stateless, to asylum and temporary protection procedures through the provision of free legal aid, interpretation, and other types of assistance.

·       To tackle the spread of negative perceptions about Roma refugees from Ukraine, their labelling as “economic migrants” or “social tourists”, and hate speech language, and to contribute to a positive narrative about Roma.

·       To include specific information about the concepts of anti-racism, equality, and non-discrimination, as well as antigypsyism, into existing programmes for the integration of foreign nationals into host societies.
·       To ensure effective prevention and protection of Roma refugees from human trafficking, exploitation, and gender-based violence.

·       To increase awareness amongst local authorities, mass media and other stakeholders about specific difficulties faced by Roma refugees and their needs.

·       To amend the existing national Roma strategic frameworks/Roma strategies and adjust them in a way that accommodates and addresses the needs of all refugees, including Roma women and children from Ukraine.

·       To extend the mandate of National Roma Contact Points in reception countries in order to allow them to deal with issues affecting Roma refugees.

·       To fund and implement social care support programmes for Roma refugees with specific needs, such as illiteracy, lack of familiarity with formal banking or with the Internet, etc.

·       To include Roma and Sinti civil society in the consultation processes regarding the development and implementation of short- and long-term decisions and assistance programmes aimed at refugees. Such decisions and programmes should consider the needs of most vulnerable groups.

·       To provide funds and support to civil society organizations, including Roma and pro-Roma ones, and to other entities who have responded to the needs of refugees from Ukraine, and strengthen their capacity.

·       To ensure that people with dual citizenship, including Roma fleeing from Ukraine, are not discriminated against and are provided adequate protection and support without the burden of lengthy administrative procedures.

·       To extend eligibility criteria for temporary protection under the EU Temporary Protection Directive in a diverse and inclusive way and in line with principles of non-discrimination as guaranteed by international and European law. This should further ensure that lack of identification documents does not prevent Roma refugees and other stateless people from seeking protection in reception countries.

·       To ensure that refugees who wish to return to Ukraine are provided with relevant assistance, and those who cannot return have access to temporary protection and temporary residence permits.

·       To prevent and address situations of statelessness, and to ensure that every child has a birth registration document.

·       To establish and put in place counselling programmes for all refugees, including Roma, in all reception countries.

·       To facilitate the collection of funds aimed at providing support and help for Roma refugees.

·       Where Roma mediators are used by state authorities, engage them in this work and assistance for Roma refugees.

·       To support civil society organisations working with refugees with psycho-social assistance and legal advice.

·       To explicitly support survivors of the Holocaust in Ukraine and to support their evacuation if requested.

For OSCE structures, including ODIHR-CPRSI

·       OSCE/ODIHR to provide training to Roma civil society organizations and activists on the following topics: How to respond to the needs of Roma refugees in line with human rights principles; working in a trauma-informed way; international human rights and humanitarian law standards; crisis management; risk mitigation; communication with local and national authorities; advocacy and building bridges at the international and transnational levels.

·       ODIHR-CPRSI to conduct continuous monitoring of the situation of Roma refugees in Ukraine and in reception countries.

·       ODIHR-CPRSI to conduct monitoring missions to the Czech Republic, Germany, Hungary, Moldova, Poland, Romania, and Slovakia to assess the human rights situation of Roma refugees from Ukraine.

·       ODIHR-CPRSI to conduct a situation assessment mission and produce a subsequent report on the human rights situation of Roma in Ukraine in light of the ongoing conflict.

·       ODIHR-CPRSI to facilitate the exchange of possible good practices found in Ireland and Norway to reception countries, in respect to providing support to Roma refugees.

·       ODIHR-CPRSI to reiterate the commitments of the OSCE participating States with respect to Roma in the context of the ongoing conflict in Ukraine, and to encourage efforts targeting refugees without identification documents for assistance with acquiring valid identification.

·       ODIHR-CPRSI to follow up with participating States on the issues flagged by civil society in regard to the segregation, discrimination and other forms of unequal treatment of Roma refugees in the reception countries.

·       ODIHR-CPRSI to keep regular consultations with civil society organizations and to facilitate information-sharing among activists and human rights defenders at the international and national level.

·       OSCE High Commissioner on National Minorities to conduct field visits to the Czech Republic, Hungary, Moldova, and Slovakia to investigate interethnic conflicts and tensions that have the potential to arise in relation to Roma and other minority refugees from Ukraine, and to investigate existing incidents targeting Roma refugees.

For civil society

·       To prepare a joint statement from the members of the IRCG to the Ukrainian authorities urging them to pay more attention to the situation of Ukrainian citizens of Roma origin and other socially and economically vulnerable groups.

·       To maintain coordination among all members of the IRCG by means of conducting periodic meetings, data collection and aggregation.

For the mass media

·       To abide by the ethical guidelines of the Declaration of Principles on the Conduct of Journalists and the Global Charter of Ethics for Journalists of the International Federation of Journalists[2] when publishing material about internally displaced Roma people and Roma refugees from Ukraine.

For other stakeholders

·       European Commission to extend the provisions of the Temporary Protection Directive to all people fleeing Ukraine, including to third-country nationals.

·       European Commission to extend the protection period of the Temporary Protection Directive beyond March 2023.

·       European Commission to call on the activation of the Temporary Protection Directive for other recurring crises.

·       European Commission to call on EU Member States to ensure that racial minorities and other refugees are not profiled and/or discriminated against when applying for temporary protection under the Temporary Protection Directive and that not forced to apply for asylum, including when lacking any personal documentation, as is the case of many Roma.

·       European Commission to communicate with the European Border and Coast Guard Agency to ensure that border authorities understand the provisions within the Temporary Protection Directive which allow for the issuing of emergency documentation to those without passports.

·       European Commission to urgently inquire from the Member States of the European Union to report on their short-, mid- and long-term plans on ensuring equal treatment of Roma refugees from Ukraine.

·       European Commission to support the process of adaptation and implementation of the strategy for promoting the realisation of the rights and opportunities of persons belonging to the Roma national minority in Ukrainian society for the period up to 2030.

·       International Committee of the Red Cross to ensure provision of humanitarian aid for Roma people in Ukraine through the active involvement of Roma civil society organizations.

·       International human rights organizations to monitor the human rights situation of Roma refugees and to flag the most significant concerns related to discrimination and unequal treatment towards of Roma in Ukraine and in reception countries.

·       United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees to provide more information about the situation at border crossings, in particular regarding undocumented and stateless Roma.

·       Intergovernmental organizations to co-ordinate joint efforts on addressing the specific concerns of Roma refugees.

·       General: To support Roma volunteers and provide funding to Roma civil society organizations working with Roma refugees.

·       General: To establish contact with humanitarian organizations working at the borders and in reception centres to raise awareness about specific barriers for Roma refugees and to build bridges with Roma volunteers.

Signatories to this message:

Organizations:

Asociația Jurisților Romi ROMAJUST

European Roma Grassroots Organizations (ERGO) Network

European Roma Rights Centre (ERRC)

Jaw Dikh Foundation

Zentralrat Deutscher Sinti and Roma

 

Individuals:

Gwendolyn Albert

Eugen Ghiță

Elżbieta Mirga-Wójtowicz

[1] https://www.unhcr.org/dach/wp-content/uploads/sites/27/2017/09/AUT_Handbook-Asylum-Interpreting_en.pdf

[2] https://www.ifj.org/who/rules-and-policy/global-charter-of-ethics-for-journalists.html