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Gypsies clash with cops
24/02/2004 15:57  - (SA)  


Bratislava - About 300 to 400 gypsies clashed with Slovak police during a protest over reduced welfare benefits, an interior ministry spokesperson said, quoted by the TASR agency.

No one was seriously injured during the clashes in Trebisov, eastern Slovakia late on Monday, during which several police cars were damaged.

The protesters, who met in the town centre in late afternoon, threw bottles and stones at police seeking to disperse the gathering, deemed illegal by the authorities.

Interior ministry spokesperson Boris Azaltovic, said several people were arrested, including the demonstration's organisers, without providing more details, the TASR agency reported.

The sizeable gypsy minority in Slovakia - around half a million people or a tenth of the population - has become increasingly restive.

Such protests have accompanied the looting of shops in the east and south-east of the country where most of the Roma live.

Since the fall of communism they have suffered high unemployment rates, reaching 100% in some villages.

Benefit cuts were introduced this year. Under the new system, benefit recipients are obliged to perform ten hours of communal work per week, or risk a sharp decrease in payments which have been reduced anyway.

A new group, the parliament of Slovakian Roma, has called on the gypsy minority to protest throughout the country on Wednesday, gathering at town halls and keeping their children away from school for an hour.

Edited by Tisha Steyn


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