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Feb. 24, 2004. 05:32 PM |
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Unrest is country's most serious civil disturbance since end of Communist rule BRATISLAVA, Slovakia (AP) - The government deployed more than 2,000 police and soldiers to central and eastern Slovakia today to quell rioting by Gypsies protesting government welfare cuts. It was the largest deployment of law enforcement in the Eastern European country since the communist era. The violence erupted Monday when police clashed with up to 400 Gypsies, also known as Roma, who had gathered in the eastern city of Trebisov for an unauthorized demonstration to protest cuts in welfare payments to jobless families. Some of the demonstrators plundered a grocery store. When police tried to break up the crowd, protesters threw rocks and glass bottles, Interior Minister Vladimir Palko told reporters. Palko said police used water cannons to try to disperse the crowd, the first time the government has taken such action since 1989, the year communism ended in then-Czechoslovakia. Four people were charged with stealing and one with attacking a police officer. Today, police detained 126 Gypsies countrywide for questioning as more looting was reported, Palko said. Earlier in the day, President Rudolf Schuster warned it could grow into a larger wave of social unrest. The ferocity of the response has raised awareness of the plight of the Roma, the poorest community in Slovakia, as the country prepares to join the European Union in May along with nine other countries. The pro-business government of Prime Minister Mikulas Dzurinda implemented the cuts this month in a move the government contends will motivate the long-term unemployed to seek jobs. Roma make up about nine per cent of the country's 5.4 million people. The poorest live in settlements where there are almost no jobs at all. Under the new system, two unemployed parents and five children would be eligible to receive up to $420 Cdn per month if the adults do community work. They previously could receive up to $555 per month. The head of the Slovak Romany Council, a group that represents Roma issues, welcomed the deployment of troops, and was working with police in Kosice, the largest city in eastern Slovakia. |
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