Hundreds of locals in Zemunik Gornji (Zadar County) gathered on Sunday to protest against Roma gypsies settling near the town's landfill.The head of the district Josip Marusic said the town was not racist, but that the Roma's lifestyle contradicted that of the majority of residents who had complained about Roma burning tires and polluting their environment."We simply want them to leave," Marusic said, claiming that the authorities had tried talking with the settlers "with little success." He avoided any comparisons to France, where over 1,000 Roma had been expelled from illegal camps in the past few weeks.The Roma arrived at the Zemunik landfill in search of scrap metal and other raw materials for resale. Many of them then moved into the abandoned homes and caravans of Serbs who left the area during the 1990's war. For the first time since the war, the area's Serb and Croat residents have united under a common cause to expel the Roma from the properties they say they occupy illegally.Although coming to Zemunik almost every summer, this year the number of Roma swelled after floods in eastern Slavonia destroyed most of their belongings and properties.The Roma representative in the Croatian Parliament Nazif Memedi, said he would do everything in his power to ensure the Roma people were allowed to stay.
Source: Croatian Times Online News
0 comments:
Post a Comment