Holocaust Survivor: Bulgaria Discriminates Roma

Diplomacy | January 27, 2011, Thursday // 18:14|  views

German Chancellor Angela Merkel (C) shakes hands with Dutch-born Roma Holocaust survivor Zoni Weisz (L) after his speech at the Bundestag on January 27 2011. Photo by EPA/BGNES

Bulgaria, Romania, Italy and France are discriminating their Roma minorities, according to Dutch gypsy and Holocaust survivor Zoni Weisz.

Zoni Weisz spoke on Thursday during the commemoration of Nazi victims in front of the Bundestag. The first Roma guest of honor Germany's official Holocaust remembrance day ceremony has stated his people now face new threats.

"Discrimination, stigmatization and the exclusion of the gypsies are normal in most societies across Europe," Weiz said before the German legislative chamber, pointing out Bulgaria, Romania, Italy and France as examples.

According to historians, somewhere about 220 to 500,000 gypsies were eliminated during Holocaust. Weisz is the only survivor in his family, who was deported in 1944 when he was 7 years old.

January 27 was chosen as the International Holocaust Remembrance Day by UN's General Assembly in 2005. It is the anniversary of the liberation of the Nazi concentration camps and the end of the Holocaust which resulted in the annihilation of 6 million European Jews and millions of others by the Nazi German regime.

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Tags: Holocaust, zoni weisz, Roma, gypsy, discrimination, remembrance

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