Applauding France for expelling dozens of Roma, Italy said it wanted to expel citizens of other EU states who live solely off state benefits. Its interior minister said he will ask the European Commission to endorse such a plan.
Background
According to the European Commission, the Roma are the EU's largest ethnic minority, and trace their origins to medieval India. There are many Roma subgroups living in Europe.
Current census statistics state that 535,000 Roma live in Romania, 370,000 in Bulgaria, 205,000 in Hungary, 89,000 in Slovakia and 108,000 in Serbia. Some 200,000 Roma are estimated to live in the Czech Republic, while the same number are estimated to reside in Greece and an estimated 500,000 are in Turkey.
Many Roma from Eastern Europe moved to the West following the EU's enlargement, creating tensions, particularly in Italy (EurActiv 30/06/09).
An estimated 15.000 Roma from Romania and Bulgaria live in France. The French government is presently expelling large numbers of them in groups (EurActiv 19/08/10).
Interior Minister Roberto Maroni said the European Commission had denied Italy permission to expel citizens of other EU states who live solely off state benefits, but that he would resume lobbying and push for the change at a 6 September meeting of EU interior ministers.
France this week sent dozens of Roma on flights home to Romania in a mass repatriation that it says is voluntary, though some said they were coerced to leave.
Applauding France's move, Maroni, from the anti-immigrant Northern League party, said mandatory deportation of Roma who do not meet basic requirements should now be allowed.
"Yes, expulsions just like those for illegal immigrants, not assisted or voluntary repatriations," Maroni told the Corriere della Sera daily in an interview published Saturday.
"Naturally just for those who violate rules on requirements for living in another [EU] member state: a minimum level of income, adequate housing and not being a burden on the social welfare system of the country hosting them. Many Roma are EU citizens but do not respect any of these requirements."
The policy would apply to all non-Italian EU citizens who fail to meet certain criteria, not just Roma, said Maroni when asked if such a plan would be discriminatory.
"If anything, the problem is something else: unlike in France, many Roma and Sinti here have Italian citizenship. They have the right to remain here. Nothing can be done."
'Racism'
Maroni's comments were immediately denounced by the political opposition, including the Italy of Values party which said the plan smacked of racism.
"The government is making distorted, discriminatory and racist use of indisputable principles like the right to security and respect of law," Leoluca Orlando, spokesman for Italy of Values, said in a statement.
"Faced with a clearly discriminatory attitude towards Roma who are EU citizens, we're forced to talk about a false respect for legality and a degeneration of European rules."
The centre-right government of Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi has drawn similar accusations from opposition parties and human rights groups with its policies to root out illegal immigration and crime.
Many Italians associate Roma, in particular, with crime and begging. Last year the European Council's high commissioner for human rights said Roma and Sinti people in Italy were subject to "a persistent climate of intolerance".
In 2008 Berlusconi's government proposed fingerprinting Roma and their children, but partially backed down after coming under a barrage of criticism, saying the policy would apply first to those living in Italy that could not provide identification, before being extended to all residents with identity cards.
Last year, forcing children to beg was made a jailable offence, a measure seen as targeting the Roma.
Berlusconi accuses the left of wanting an "invasion of foreigners". Since coming to power his government has made illegal entry and residency a criminal offence and repelled vessels carrying migrants heading towards Italy.
(EurActiv with Reuters.)
Positions
Italian Interior Minister Roberto Maroni on Saturday praised France's crackdown on Roma and travellers, saying that French President Nicolas Sarkozy's government was "simply copying Italy".
In an interview with Italian daily Corriere Della Sera entitled "we will be tougher than Sarkozy," Maroni said that in its latest moves, France had "only copied" Italy in dealing with Roma over the last few years.
Asked if taking aim at Roma immigrants was discriminatory, Maroni said that "expulsions should be possible" for citizens of the EU in general, and not just Roma.
Domestic critics of the Sarkozy government's security and immigration policies are confined to "a small politico-media Parisian milieu" and the "billionaire left […] divorced from French reality," French Interior Minister Brice Hortefeux told Le Monde newspaper. The paper's reporter noted an "unaccustomed, aggressive and pugnacious tone" in the minister's remarks. The Roma crackdown does not aim to stigmatise any community, Hortefeux insisted, adding that its opponents have come up with "no alternative solution, no credible proposition, no thought-out initiative".
"Why should I back down?" Hortefeux is quoted as saying.
Asked about criticism from the UN or the European Commission, he said: "Let everyone take up their responsibilities."
Asked about criticism from the French left, he said: "On security and immigration, as well as on taxation and retirement, the left is silent because it has nothing to say. Its silence is a programme."
The repatriation of the Roma from France is only a temporary measure and its effects will not be very beneficial, Leonard Orban, a former Romanian EU commissioner who is currently counsellor to his country's president, Traian Basescu, is quoted by the Romanian press as saying.
''Relations with France are already tense and I hope the tension will decrease in the next period,'' said Orban, who according to EurActiv Romania is the first Romanian politician to admit this.
''I don't want to comment on the declarations by Mr Lellouche [French State Secretary for European Affairs Pierre Lellouche recently called for a 'European solution' to the Roma problem]. He threatened Romania regarding its integration to the Schengen space and similarly for its access to cohesion funds, including for the integration of the Roma communities. Those are things that are […] worrying for the Romanian authorities,'' Orban is quoted as saying.
Pope Benedict XVI on Sunday asked French pilgrims to welcome people of all origins, just days after France had repatriated more than 200 Roma and Gypsies in a controversial crackdown.
The Vatican had criticised the crackdown on Friday, saying Paris was flouting European norms.
"One cannot generalise and take an entire group of people and kick them out," said Agostino Marchetto, secretary of the Pontifical Council for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerant People, a Vatican body.
"The mass expulsions of Roma are against European norms," Marchetto told AFP. "I think the issue of our travelling brothers' integration goes beyond France. It's a European issue."
Next Steps
- 6 Sept.: Justice and Home Affairs Council.