Niš, Serbia: ERRC calls for urgent action after winter power-cut plunges Roma into the dark and cold
01 December 2025
At the onset of winter, the authorities cut the power supply to the Romani community Crvena Zvezda in Niš, leaving dozens of families once again exposed to the elements in degrading and perilous living conditions. The ERRC and Group for Children and Youth ‘Indigo’ have called on the mayor to immediately restore the electricity supply to the affected families to prevent further harm in winter.
This sudden decision to cut the electricity has deprived these families of the means to heat their homes, prepare food, store medication, or maintain minimal hygiene. As temperatures plunge, the lives of the very young and the very old, as well as those with disabilities and chronic illnesses have been put at even greater risk. The absence of light and heat adds intolerable emotional strain on family and social life, as families and neighbours are left idle once darkness falls, increasing tension and conflict in an already deprived environment, further stripping an entire community of its dignity.
This callous action is rendered even more reprehensible by the fact that the discriminatory nature of repeated power-cuts in Crvena Zvezda is already the subject of a pending complaint before the Serbian Constitutional Court. Going ahead with yet another power cut while the case remains under judicial scrutiny undermines the effectiveness of the ongoing legal remedy, and intensifies the harm experienced by residents. In their letter protesting this prejudicial and perilous action, the ERRC and the Group for Children and Youth ‘Indigo’ reminded the mayor of Niš that:
“Access to electricity is indispensable for the realisation of a range of other rights: persons with medical conditions cannot safely store or use their medication, maintain hygiene, or carry out necessary treatments; children and students cannot study or do homework after daylight ends as early as 4 p.m., nor can they participate in any meaningful activity contributing to their development, let alone play or enjoy family life.”
This crisis is down to anti-Roma discrimination and institutional neglect. The Crvena Zvezda neighbourhood has existed for more than five decades, but remains excluded from the municipality’s spatial and urban development plans. As a consequence, residents have been prevented from obtaining standard, individual electricity connections to the public power grid. Instead, the entire community has been obliged to rely on only two collective meters, a model which is neither used in non-Roma neighbourhoods, nor compliant with principles of equal access to public utilities. This discriminatory arrangement exposes all households to collective billing, collective blame if debts accrue, and collective punishment in the form of power cuts, disconnecting the many families who have no arrears.
Such arbitrary and discriminatory punitive action raises serious concerns under Serbia’s various domestic and international human rights obligations; and wilfully puts rights-deprived and impoverished people further in harm’s way and in very real danger. As the letter states:
“The risks are not abstract – during a previous electricity cut in 2018, at least one resident reportedly froze to death, illustrating the very real and potentially fatal consequences of such measures. At this moment, a resident has just been released from hospital after a foot amputation due to diabetic complications and is prevented from treating the wound properly, storing the insulin in the fridge, maintaining hygiene and recovering both physically and emotionally.”
The protest letter calls for a prompt, proportionate, and rights-compliant response from Mayor Dragoslav Pavlović and the competent authorities. The demands are clear:immediately restore the electricity supply to the affected families to prevent further harm during winter; and as a matter of priority, sort out a fair and non-discriminatory power supply arrangement to prevent any recurrences of such collective punishments.
The full text of the letter can be accessed here in Serbian, and here in English.
