Urgent news from Tula, Central Russia - evictions of Roma families planned.

[Mr. Valery Novoselsky]

According to reports from Tula, local municipal authorities are planning the demolition of 127 Roma houses in the area of Roma settlement Plekhanovo on Wednesday, 25th May.

 

During the last week local police initiated 5 raids resulted in false accusations of local Roma population in "threats to society" and "keeping of weapons". Local media nowadays are full of anti-Roma articles.

 

The situation in the settlement of Plekhanovo is alarming: children are unable to attend school, their parents can not go to work, all population in a settlement is afraid to leave houses.

 

The chairman of Federal National Cultural Authonomy of Russian Roma Nadezhda Demeter is planning to visit the office of a mayor of Tula Mr. Evgeny Avilov on Monday, 23 May, with the aim of prevention of evictions of local Roma population.

 

Contacts:

 

Nadezhda Demeter: Tel. +7 916 9502297 (English, Russian, Romanes)

 

Ivanov Ruslan: Tel. +7 95 20190030 (Romanes, Russian)