Main focus of Friday, September 3, 2010

EU voices cautious criticism of Roma deportation

In an internal document the EU Commission has expressed doubts about the lawfulness of France's repatriation of Roma to Bulgaria and Romania. Commentators praise Brussels' criticisms of the French expulsions but find they don't go far enough.

Frankfurter Rundschau - Germany

The EU is reacting far too hesitantly to France's Roma deportations, writes the left-liberal daily Frankfurter Rundschau: "The Brussels EU Commission ... has a questionable reputation for evading conflicts with member states on a regular basis. This is particularly true when the states in question are big and powerful. Yet the authority has the clout to confidently tackle national governments if it only dared. But it doesn't dare, as the mass deportations of Roma from France show. The behaviour of the Commission is unworthy of its status. It has major misgivings about the conduct of Nicolas Sarkozy's French government. But it is not presenting those objections in an offensive manner. And Commission boss Barroso remains silent." (03/09/2010)

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Le Jeudi - Luxembourg

France's policy regarding the Roma is intolerant and harks back to the past, writes the weekly Le Jeudi: "In the space of a few months and for basely political reasons, the current leaders of our neighbour France have made their country a blemish on the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Even the Pope has become annoyed by the affair. ... To get the president back in shape - who would receive a severe clouting at the hands of the socialist opposition if the French were to go the polls today - the advisors at the Élysée Palace could come up with nothing better than to harvest intensively the fields of intolerance. And to brandish two menaces that evoke the days when just belonging to a population group was enough to have one sent to a death camp: the stigmatisation of a people - in this case the Roma - and the loss of French citizenship." (02/09/2010)

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Dagens Nyheter - Sweden

Sweden's Minister for European Union Affairs Birgitta Ohlsson has voiced criticism of France's deportations of members of the Roma community. But the outrage at France is hypocritical given Sweden's harsh deportation practice for Roma, writes the liberal Swedish daily Dagens Nyheter. "Ohlsson hasn't minced her words in her criticism of France. That is justified, but not even the French police deport Roma during their first three months in the country. ... It is important that the EU Commission has begun to react, and that commissioners Cecilia Malmström and Viviane Reding should question France about what is going on. The French mass expulsions are deeply disturbing, as is the disgraceful policy towards the Roma in Bulgaria and Romania. But for Sweden's criticism to hold water the first thing we have to do is clean up the back yard at [the seat of government] Rosenbad." (03/09/2010)

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More from the press review on the subject » International Relations, » Migration, » Minorities, » France, » Sweden, » Europe

Adevărul - Romania

It serves no purpose to deport the Roma, writes the daily Adevărul, arguing that their mentality has to change: "Even the Romanian communists tried to control the Gypsies as they moved from place to place with their clans. They thought they should build houses on the outskirts of towns. Were they ever in for a surprise when they saw that the Gypsies slept in tents and kept their horses in the houses. Now the French are sending them back to homes they don't even have, because they're nomads even if they travel by plane nowadays instead of covered wagons. This is the major challenge facing France and Europe: to change the mentality of an ethnic group that lives in the modern world according to social rules that are hundreds if not thousands of years old. ... Otherwise instead of a decrease in crime all we'll get is an increase in air traffic with Gypsies being sent here, there and everywhere." (03/09/2010)

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More from the press review on the subject » EU Policy, » Migration, » Integration, » Minorities, » France, » Romania
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