WRITTEN QUESTION P-1973/03

by Anna Karamanou (PSE) to the Commission

(5 June 2003)

Subject: Violation by FYROM of the rights of Roma

According to an announcement made by Doctors of the World, some 600 Roma at the border between FYROM and Greece, close to the border crossing at Medzitlia (among them 270 children, ten pregnant women and numerous elderly people) are suffering flagrant violation of their human rights. The refugees have been living in the open with no tents or any other form of protection against the sun and rain, with no basic sanitary facilities, since last March when the UN High Commissioner for Refugees and FYROM's Labour Ministry banned their encampment and cut off supplies of food, water and power. On 22 May, the FYROM security forces forcibly removed the refugees from the borders, while the Roma do not have travel documents and are totally dependent on the authorities.

What steps will the Commission take, in the context of the EU-FYROM Association Agreement, to ensure respect for human rights and re-establish decent living conditions for the Roma at Medzitlia?

Answer given by Mr Vitorino on behalf of the Commission

(3 July 2003)

The Commission is closely following developments in the situation of over 600 Roma gathered at the border of the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM) and Greece near the Medzitlija border post, including the continued involvement of the Commission delegation in Skopje. Three Roma representatives were received at the delegation office on 30 May 2003 and delegation staff also visited the encampment near the border.

On the basis of the latest information available, the persons in the group are receiving basic humanitarian aid in the form of food, sanitary facilities and medical care from the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) and various non-governmental organisations (including the Macedonian Red Cross, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC)/International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), the Swiss Red Cross (SRC), Caritas, Cooperazione Italiana, etc.).

The international community (representatives of the United Nations Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK), the European Union, the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), the Council of Europe, UNHCR, IOM, etc.) have also been mobilised and are assisting the FYROM Government and the persons concerned to find solutions. These persons are part of a group which fled from Kosovo in 1999 and was granted precarious temporary status in FYROM, renewable every six months, with little in the way of social rights. Most of them resided formerly in the Suto Orizari collective centre opened in 1999 and closed by the UNHCR in April 2003 because of its seriously dilapidated state. The most vulnerable (around 150) were offered accommodation in a second collective centre for Roma at Katlanavo, and private accommodation together with basic financial assistance was planned for the remainder of the group. These options were turned down by the persons concerned who chose to protest against their living conditions at the above border post (and requested access to countries in the Union).

The Commission's position has always been that the conditions governing residence status and social rights for these persons, who have now been in FYROM for four years, should be improved. For that reason, in cooperation with the UNHCR, it has supported revision of the FYROM law on asylum, which should lead to entry into force of the new law in September 2003, providing for a fair asylum procedure, better reception conditions for asylum seekers, respect for the principle of non-refoulement and local integration measures for those granted protection. The Commission is pleased to note that the FYROM Government is prepared to anticipate application of this law and allow those concerned to submit applications for asylum and have then examined.

Under the national CARDS programme, a project endowed with EUR 2 million has been set up to help the FYROM Government review its legislation on asylum and launch a national action programme on matters of asylum, migration and visas, together with a training programme. EUR 1 million has been earmarked in 2003 to continue the 2002 programme. The European Agency for Reconstruction is studying the ways of continuing the programme and of defining the content in more detail.

The Commission consequently endorses the Declaration of 3 June 2003 by the Union Heads of Mission in Skopje, who stressed that they had given most serious consideration to the steps taken by the Kosovar Roma in Medzitlija to improve their situation and strongly encouraged them to accept the offer made by the FYROM Government to leave the border area and return to Skopje.

Moreover, the Commission is also continuing to support the efforts of the international community to put in place appropriate conditions for the voluntary return to Kosovo of the persons displaced in 1999, including those of Roma origin.