ERRC Concerns: Bulgaria
26 May 2005
ERRC monitoring and field missions in Bulgaria, as well as information published by domestic NGO partners, have indicated that Roma are the targets of racially motivated violence, police abuse, and systematic racial discrimination. These acts occur with alarming frequency. National and local authorities offer little protection from violence and discrimination and often block the victims' access to effective remedies. Areas of particular concern include the following:
Violence against Roma continues to be reported with worrying frequency and intensity. Many such reports involve police action against Roma. Abuse of Roma includes:
Torture and ill-treatment of Roma in police custody;
Racist intimidation and harassment by police;
In some localities, entire Romani communities have been threatened with expulsion by non-Roma.
When Roma rights violations occur,
non-prosecution of the perpetrators is the norm. Romani victims are frequently denied justice for the following reasons:
Authorities do not open criminal investigations when Roma fall victims to human rights abuse;
Authorities conduct inadequate and often purely formal investigations into anti-Romani actions.
Discrimination: Direct and indirect discrimination pervades all aspects of the relationship between the non-Romani majority and the Romani minority in Bulgaria.
Discrimination in education, notably:
The majority of Romani children attend racially segregated classes or schools;
Romani children are over-represented in special education facilities;
Where Romani children attend regular schools, incidents of physical abuse and humiliating treatment by both the school staff and the non-Romani children have been reported.
Regardless of four-year successful pilot NGO-led desegregation programmes, the feasibility of which has been recognised by the government, government commitments to start a national programme for school desegregation of Roma remain largely rhetoric -- a number of documents have been issued by the Ministry of Education, yet to date no funds have been allocated for desegregation action and no preparatory work has started either.
Discrimination in the field of housing, notably:
A disturbing number of Romani communities in Bulgaria are effectively segregated;
Residents of the all-Romani neighbourhoods massively lack legal security of tenure -- around 70% of the Romani housing is unlawful, i.e. not covered by zoning maps and/or built without proper permission;
Roma are particularly vulnerable to forced evictions, while Bulgarian legislation is at variance with international human rights law with regard to due process guarantees and guarantees against homelessness in case of forced evictions. For example, Bulgarian state and municipal property laws provide for administrative evictions, while the complaint for such administrative acts before the court does not suspend their enforcement and there are no guarantees against homelessness;
Some Bulgarian authorities have engaged in forced evictions of Roma, without providing adequate housing alternatives;
Romani housing facilities are often characterized by a lack of basic utilities such as sanitation, access to transportation, etc.
Discrimination in access to medical care, including:
Roma are often denied access to medical facilities and treatments on racist grounds;
Some forensic doctors refuse to issue medical certificates for Romani persons physically abused by state actors;
Many Roma are excluded from access to health care services due to lack of health insurance;
Doctors acting as primary care physicians under the Bulgarian Health Insurance Acts reportedly sometimes refuse to take on Romani patients on racist grounds; Romani persons living in conditions of extreme poverty are reportedly in practice excluded from coverage by the health insurance system under the Bulgarian Health Insurance Act because they cannot afford to pay their monthly contribution or the additional payments associated, for example, with hospital stays;
Additionally, the access of Romani persons to health services is often impeded because many Romani communities live in isolated villages or on the outskirts of the cities, in areas with neither public transportation nor readily available telephone service.
Discrimination in employment: Racial animus plays a significant role in the failure of Roma to secure gainful employment.
Discrimination in access to goods and services, notably:
In numerous places throughout Bulgaria, Roma are banned from access to, or are refused service in, shops, restaurants, discotheques, and other public places;
Eligibility requirements for social benefits disproportionately impact Roma and effectively discriminate against them. Furthermore, local authorities engage in discriminatory practices in granting the social benefits prescribed by law to Romani persons;
Roma living in the all-Romani neighbourhoods throughout the country are regularly left without access to electricity for long periods of time, including the winter months. Whole Romani neighbourhoods have been collectively disconnected from the electricity power supply regardless of the fact that not all consumers have been indebted to the electricity provider.
