European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - January 24, 1993, Darmstadt, Hesse While Europe a Rise by Richard o Mara the Baltimore Sun ear is Riding in the cockpit of Europe As the worst recession in half a Century grinds on. People Are alarmed by the atrocities of extremists incidents of growing frequency that for some recall the dangerous Days of the 1930s. Xenophobia flourishes stimulated by the wide spread perception that Europe is about to been gulped by refugees from the continent s South and East and from Africa and Asia. Nothing reflected that fear so clearly As the British Home Secretary s decision in the fall to ban from Britain 180 bosnian refugees women children and elderly approved by the red Cross As Quot victims of War with terrible creative and Strong leadership at the National and International Levels in Europe seems in Short Supply. On every Side obdurate minorities frustrate the Progress desired by majorities. In France a Small fraction of Farmers holds up a Trade Deal Between the United states and the european Community. That would Advance the fortunes of Over a Hundred countries and help propel the world out of recession. It in Germany a few thousand Neo nazis raise the fright level throughout the country and bully the political establishment into deporting gypsies and diminishing Europe s most humane Asylum Law. The French political process contends with Jean Marie be pen who has raised his. National front party to prominence by blaming everything from unemployment to social malaise on arabs not the Rich land in France some immigrants Many French born. In Britain the hard times trigger racist attacks on Blacks and West asians they also have thrown up one of the weirdest of Phenomena nazi Rock a music of hate and belligerence favored by right Wing skinheads the tattooed men with the big boots and a penchant for kicking in Peoples Heads. The bands popular among them Are Skut head and screwdriver. In Italy the right Wing Lombard league suggests the country be Cut in half Rich North from poor South sort of like the rest of the United states divorcing Mississippi and Alabama. Alessandra Mussolini the Beautiful granddaughter of Benito strives to make fascism fashionable again As a member of parliament representing the fascist italian social movement. Quot my Grandfather was a great Man Quot she has said. Quot i have a bust of him in my now attention is drawn to a country previously not much noticed in this context but the country that gave fascism its longest period of legitimacy in this Century Spain. Three months ago four masked gunmen burst into an abandoned discotheque in a Madrid suburb and shot to death a homeless immigrant from the dominican Republic Lucrecia Perez and seriously wounded another. The killers according to Madrid s civil governor belonged to a Spanish fascist gang. Thus Spain is experiencing the same anxieties As Germany France England Italy and All the rest. Unemployment is climbing. The recessions grip tightens. The reaction there is much the same. Signs appear Quot criminal immigrants Quot Quot spaniards North africans Are assaulted. Latin americans people like Perez Are accused of stealing jobs from spaniards 7 the message is much the same in Spanish As it is in French German or English. Clearly there is cause for unease though not panic. Hugh Miaow the Royal Institute of International affairs in London notes that voting for Stab b citizens of Morocco and Algeria show targets of an attack on i Clr Asylum Home in Magdeburg Germany. Listed High trying extremist parties in Western Europe has increased in the past few years but not alarmingly. Be pen s National front which claims 14 percent of Frances National vote advanced Only 4 percentage Points in four years. It took the right Wing German Republican or party six years to move from 3 percent of the National vote to its current 8 percent. In other countries a Austria Switzerland Belgium Sweden Italy a none of the legitimate extreme right Wing parties has yet to move past 10 percent according to Mial s statistics. Quot there has been gradual growth Over the years Quot he says Quot not very dramatic but in the context its a pretty solid group of people who arc supporting fairly unacceptable policies within the they remain tiny minorities. But some of them arc violent. Europe in fact is virtually tyrannize by its gypsies problems continued from Page 6 the 1,5 million in nazi occupied Europe were murdered in the concentration Camps Rose said. In Austria and Germany Rose said 25,000 of the 35,000 gypsies held in concentration Camps were murdered. Rose said there arc two reasons Why the Fate of the gypsies is so Little known and that the Fate of the jews better publicized Quot after the War the jewish minority had an articulate lobby that was Able to pressure the allies into looking after their rights and above All make known. Internationally the horrible crimes committed by the nazis. Quot the older generation of sinti and Roma were not Able to direct Public attention to their Fate. They were a physically and psychologically broken people. We Are now better Able to state our Case because the postwar generation has a different mentality and is More Rose said there was initial resistance by sinti and Roma about stepping out in the limelight and supporting his attempts at organization. Even he was reluctant about proclaiming he was a Gypsy. Quot i m a carpet merchant and i was afraid of the German prejudice that everything gypsies sell is stolen a he said. Quot so i was satisfied to let them think i was persian or French but then there came a Lime when i had to face my Rose said the first attempt to organize was made in 1956, but gypsies Quot were too timid to push for their rights. Quot in addition the allies Felt no moral obligation to see hat our human rights were respected. That a violent minorities. Thus parallels arc drawn with the 1930s, that Era of depression when demagogues stoked Peoples darkest instincts and the world drifted into War. Many in Europe remember those Days which is Why so Many Are so seared. Academics and diplomats tend to discredit such comparisons. They emphasize instead the great differences Between then and now the anti racism marches he reactions of right thinking europeans Quot there Are no mainstream parties with Street cadres fighting it out in the streets Quot says Christopher husbands the London school of economics expert on right Wing extremism in Europe. In terms of the violence Quot we re still talking about people measured in the thousands rather than in the tens of thousands. As Jong As that persists it remains a police matter rather than a political matter Quot Why it was a positive development when during my trip to the United states in 1989, the americans declared a Day of remembrance of the National socialists crimes against gypsies in which members of the . Congress also . At that time Rose said Elic Wiesel Nobel peace prize Winner in 1986, author and director of the holocaust memorial declared gypsies were victims for the same reason As the jews. In May 1986, the White House appointed a Gypsy 43-Ycar-old William Duna of Minneapolis to the . Holocaust memorial Council. Duna a publisher who also owns a music school writes books on music and Gypsy history. The . Holocaust memorial Council was established in 1980 by president Jimmy Carter to Honor the memory of those who perished in the holocaust in a press release by the Romani Union Headquarters in Bern Switzerland Duna said gypsies were excluded from the Council when it was created because no one seemed to be aware of the Gypsy holocaust. The 2,5 million Gypsy population in communist Romania was one of 13 officially recognized minorities in the country. Since the fall of the communist regime the gypsies have become scapegoats for the economic misery that plagues the land in the forefront of the anti Gypsy but also anti hungarian minority Are the nationalistic Vatra to Manes a organization and orthodox communist circles. Pug Orns and forced sterilization of the gypsies were practice in several former communist states As late As the 1980s. Many gypsies came to Germany seeking work and safety for their Tarn lies. De Reavis january 24, ej03 sunday a Pace i
