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World / Europe Print article | Email
Slovak gypsies riot over cuts to benefits
By Robert Anderson in Prague and Michel Fris in Bratislava
Published: February 24 2004 4:00 | Last Updated: February 24 2004 4:00

Impoverished Slovak gypsies have launched mass protests and begun looting grocery stores after the rightwing government slashed the social benefits on which most of them rely.

The food riots demonstrate the plight of the 375,000-strong gypsy or Roma minority, three-quarters of whom are estimated to be unemployed, and raises fears over their potential mass emigration to western Europe once Slovakia joins the European Union on May 1.

Hundreds of angry Roma from shanty towns in eastern Slovakia have descended on neighbouring villages to ransack grocery stores just as the new benefit cuts are poised to set in.

On Saturday, in the worst incident so far, 200 Roma attacked a supermarket in Trhoviste. After breaking the windows they took everything they found before police were called in and arrested 43 people, including 10 children.

"I've never seen anything like this before," said Jan Krivy, mayor of Trhoviste. "The government must do something. Roma can't handle this new [benefit] cut."

The government has assured the EU that it is tackling the problems of its Roma minority and that there will be no emigration wave once Slovaks are allowed to work in western Europe after May 1.

But it has launched a radical welfare reform to push the unemployed back to work by cutting benefits and raising tax allowances.

For those long-term jobless who cannot prove they are actively searching for work, this will cut their unemployment benefit by a half to the equivalent of €50 ($63, £34) for a family of four.

One in four Slovak Roma live in shanty towns in eastern Slovakia where unemployment is virtually 100 per cent and there are no work opportunities, particularly for Roma. Entire settlements depend on welfare payments and have lost any experience of regular work.

The government has so far chosen to view the food riots as simply a police issue and has blamed rapacious Roma money lenders for provoking the disturbances.

"Tensions in eastern Slovakia have existed for a long time," said Ludovit Kanik, labour minister. "I strongly oppose claims that welfare reform has sparked the crisis."

The government will discuss the lootings tomorrow. On the same day Roma groups have called a nationwide protest against the benefit cuts.

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