Walls, real and imagined, Surround the Roma

4 avril 2010, 11:00
Filed under: Europe de l'Est, Presse, slovakia | Tags: Gypsy, Racism, Roma, Roms, slovakia

OSTROVANY, Slovakia — The gray barrier evokes the West Bank or cold war Berlin: a 500-foot-long, 7-foot-high concrete wall that separates a Roma ghetto from the neatly manicured homes of gadzos, or white people, on the other side.

“Why didn’t they use the money to help improve our homes instead of building a wall?” asked Alena Kalejova, 22, staring out of her freezing mud hut at the wall, erected with $17,500 of public money. A powerful stench from the piles of soiled diapers, cigarette butts and rotting food strewn outside wafted into her makeshift home, which lacks running water. Her sickly toddler, Daniela, lay motionless on a rusty cot.

more … : http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/03/world/europe/03roma.html?pagewanted=all