ROMA OF GREECE: "MORE RATS THAN CHILDREN"

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 ATHENS 000238 SIPDIS SIPDIS E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: PHUM PGOV GR SUBJECT: ROMA OF GREECE: "MORE RATS THAN CHILDREN" REF: 07 ATHENS 2149 SUMMARY -------------- ¶1. From February 11 - 13, Poloff visited a dozen makeshift Roma camps within a hundred kilometers of Athens. In meeting after meeting, the terribly poor Romani occupants asked for jobs, housing and education. Evidence abounds that a GoG program offering housing loans to individual Roma families has failed; and the Roma are calling for the program to be replaced. We see few, if any, signs that Roma issues are garnering greater attention in GoG circles despite Embassy efforts to increase awareness. We will continue engaging leaders at all levels of government to make the connection between security and human rights, and for the GoG to begin to address systematically and creatively Roma issues. End summary. MORE RATS THAN CHILDREN -------------- ¶2. On February 11 - 13, a team consisting of Poloff, POL FSN, and POL Intern visited approximately twelve Roma camps in the vicinity of the port city of Patras and the greater Athens region. Several of the communities comprised fewer than 15 families, while others had 3000 to 5000 residents, often living under conditions of extreme poverty. In the community of Riganocambos, Patras, for example, 12 to 15 families live in shacks made of cardboard, plastic sheets, and corrugated tin on the very edge of a city dump, lacking running water or electricity. As we stood talking with a group of the community's adults and surrounded by 20 or so small shoeless, dirty children, dozens of rats scampered in and out of the remnants of an old automobile where the children were playing as we arrived. Five of the children and adults readily pointed out where they had been bittenby rats as they slept a day or two before our visit. One mother pulled back the blanket swaddling her weeks-old child to show the dried blood on the infant's ear lobe where a rat had bitten her the night before. In the community of Aspropyrgos outside of Athens, one Roma man said "we have more rats than children." "A PUNISHED PEOPLE" -------------- ¶3. In the communities we visited, the Roma eke out a hand-to-mouth existence by gathering scrap metal from the dumps, trash heaps and roadside dumpsters. Pickup trucks teeming with scrap metal arrived in the camps as we met with residents. The scrap metal is separated and sold to local junkyards by weight, earning enough money to feed a family for a day or two. Adult males we spoke to decried the lack of opportunities to find work. Explaining that the Greek civil service works on a point system that grants higher scores to those with a grammar school or high school education, several asked why they needed a grammar school degree to collect trash for a municipality. With the exception of some Albanian Roma, all adults that we met were illiterate - a fact they quickly divulged and also deplored as the source of many of their ills. But when asked why, therefore, they did not send their own children to schools, few had a ready answer beyond what they called the racism of Greek society, which refused their children the right to go to school. Some told of school principals allegedly lying that there was no room at the school. Others said that because they could not bathe their children or wash their hair, they were not allowed to attend school. "We are a punished people," one woman said. ¶4. One of the recurring complaints that we heard from Roma around Greece was their inability to receive a driver's license because they were illiterate. As a result, when stopped by police they were frequently ticketed for the offense of driving without a license, which carries enormous fines (several thousand euro). To pay the fines requires money that would otherwise buy food, soap or clothing. When they cannot pay the fines, offenders serve months in jail. HOUSING ISSUES -------------- ¶5. The Greek constitution provides for the right to housing, stipulating the state's special duty to secure accommodation for all. The right is not afforded to many Roma families. In almost every community, Roma were aware of a housing loan program put in place by the Greek government almost six years ago. The program offered 60,000 euro (approximately 88,800.00 USD) to Roma families to purchase a new home. In a meeting last July, Secretary General at the Ministry of the Interior, Patroclos Georgiadis, (reftel) told poloff that the program had been temporarily discontinued due to a number of ATHENS 00000238 002 OF 002 problems, including fraud and lack of oversight. Many Roma asked whether we could assist with their loan applications -- some of which had been pending for as long as five years. Others said they were denied and others explained that they received the loan but admitted that they had spent the money in ways other than for its intended purpose. One man justified buying new cars or going on vacations. "I've never seen 600 euro, let alone 60,000 euro, in my entire life. So, of course, I didn't know what to do with it. It was too much for me and I wanted to have a nice life like everybody else. So I bought a new car." With some of the remaining money, he and his wife bought an undeveloped piece of land in another village where they hoped, someday to be able to build a home. A frequent complaint was that 60,000 euro was not sufficient money to buy both land and a home. Almost without exception, interlocutors suggested that the program should be changed to require either much more direct oversight by the GoG or, better still, to have the GoG provide these extremely poor citizens with an actual home rather than simply the money to buy one. We did meet several families that had received the loan, or coupled it with their own savings and built homes or added to their shacks on land they sometimes owned. ¶6. Approximately five kilometers outside the center of Patras, we visited the urban neighborhood called St. Katherines -- but known to locals as Yiftiko (Gypsy town). There we found small, clean white stucco homes, about the size of a shed in a typical American backyard, all featuring potted plants and community garden hoses but without electricity or interior plumbing. In speaking with Greek (non-Roma) residents next to the Yiftiko, we found people only willing to talk in whispers, calling their Roma neighbors "a dirty people," who make noise at all hours of the day and night. One elderly Greek man told us that he had lived his entire life in this neighborhood but had only twice ever ventured into the Yiftiko. ¶7. While in Patras, we also met with government officials, including the Mayor, the chief prosecutor, the Nomarch (regional governor) and Vice Nomarch of the Region. All had the same basic reaction to questions about the Roma: a denial that there was really a problem and a shrug about what, if anything, could be done. "They are always happy," the chief prosecutor offered. Most officials tried to change the subject quickly, though the Mayor of Patras said that he paid the rents for 17 Roma families and helped with the mortgages for another ten who received the government housing loan. The Nomarch bristled at human rights questions from the American Embassy which he saw as responsible for most of his region's problems as a direct result of the "bombing of everyone" in Afghanistan and Iraq. COMMENT -------------- ¶8. Over the last 18 months, in dozens of meetings about Roma issues with GoG authorities, virtually every government official has had a nearly identical reaction. When the subject is mentioned, a wry smile appears followed by some version of the claim that the Roma are genetically this way, want to live this way, or are simply beyond help. Most officials seek to change the subject quickly or suffer patiently through the 'naive American' approach to a centuries old problem that they believe will never change. Nonetheless, we will continue to address these issues with GoG officials at all levels, stressing the relationship between security and human rights and urging the GoG to find new and creative ways to address problems in the Roma communities of Greece. ¶9. (Comment continued) Possible areas where Greece could be urged to make important and immediate changes: -- devise a plan for illiterate adults to be able to take and pass a driver's test -- a new housing program to begin operating with appropriate levels of oversight. -- institutionalizing the use of social workers as quasi-truant officers (as has been done in Thrace and had an enormously positive influence on the number of Roma children attending school there). -- creating real incentive programs for children to attend school These options may present the best opportunity to begin breaking the cycle of poverty among Greek Roma. SPECKHARD