Article

In the Ghetto

Roma community imprisoned by wall in Czech Republic

Unhindered by the Czech government, a town in the Czech Republic has been able to build a wall round an area occupied by Roma, confining them to a Ghetto. The town of 'Usti and Labem' began to build its two metre high wall of breeze blocks and steel around buildings on one side of Maticni Street at about 4 am one morning in early October. It was completed by the evening.

The builders were protected by an 80 strong force of police. With grim echo's of Nazi occupation, Roma people from the new ghetto were not allowed out of their houses while the wall was built. The wall has three brown steel doors to allow access to the block. It is intended that these will be locked at ten at night. The creation of the Ghetto, probably the first in post war Europe, was fought all the way by Roma activists and Human Rights institutions. Yet the Czech Government has displayed extraordinary complacency in its handling of the crisis. The proposal for the wall first appeared in May 1998 and the international community warned that the wall would be a violation of international law.

In March 1999 The UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination warned that the Czech government was not doing enough to prohibit this unlawful act of racial segregation. More recently, in June, Ramiro Cibrian, the EU envoy to the Czech Republic, said that the Czech Republic could not be considered for EU membership if the wall was built. In May 99, and again a week before the wall was built, the European Roma Rights Centre (ERRC) called on Czech authorities to halt the municipal plans to build the wall.

The first attempt to build the wall took place on October 5th, when builders put up a series of pillars, a gate, and three sections of wall before Roma, acting peacefully, blocked further construction. The next day Romani activists from around the Czech Republic came to Usti and Labem and dismantled sections of wall. By 7th October Romani activists had taken down the rest of the wall. Protests against the wall continued throughout the week both in Usti and around the Czech Republic.

It was not until two days after the first parts of the wall had been built and pulled down, that the Czech Prime Minister, Milos Zeman stated , "The wall in Usti divides the Czech Republic from the European Union."

However, other high ranking Czech officials down-played the importance of the wall and, although legally empowered to do so, Czech authorities entirely failed to prevent its construction. Indeed The Czech parliament didn't get round to annulling the original resolution of the Usti and Labem town council to build the wall until the afternoon of 13th October, two hours after the wall was completed.