Genocide of the Roma
Like the Jews, the Roma have been marked by extremely negative labels, persecution and discrimination since their arrival on European soil. They are said to have immigrated to Europe from the 9th century onwards, and the first written mentions of the Roma in Central European countries, for example, can be traced back to the 14th century. In Slovenia, the Roma began to settle permanently in the 17th and 18th centuries, mainly in Prekmurje, Dolenjska, Bela Krajina and Posavje, and Gorenjska. They were engaged in knife sharpening and blacksmithing, helped with farm work, and also earned a living by working in quarries and crushing gravel, and as musicians, entertainers and operators of carousels in travelling amusement parks. Nevertheless, due to the general belief that they were born with a tendency to vagrancy, begging, theft and fraud, they were exposed to numerous attempts by the authorities in Slovenia, as elsewhere in Europe, to ensure more effective control over them and their activities. In the 18th century, they were tried to be transformed into “decent” people by forced assimilation in the territory of the Habsburg Monarchy, and at the end of the 19th century, they began to be officially registered in many places. These registrations later became the basis for their destruction.
With the outbreak of World War II, Nazi policy towards the Roma became radicalised, similar to that towards the Jews. Systematic deportations of Roma from territories under Nazi control to concentration camps began in December 1942. Most of them were deported to Auschwitz. There they were frequent victims of medical experiments, and many Roma were killed in gas chambers. Between 1939 and 1945, the Nazis killed around 500,000 Roma, and according to some unofficial estimates, as many as a million or more. Due to the horrors they endured, the Roma were unable to speak about their cruel ordeal during the Nazi persecution for a long time. If they did, they were met with disbelief, which was merely a reflection of the centuries-old belief that the Roma were “dangerous, unreliable, a nuisance and inferior.” It was only in the last few decades, when more intensive research into the genocide of the Roma and Sinti began, that they were officially recognised as victims of genocide and entitled to compensation. Stereotypical representations and rejection of Roma communities have nevertheless persisted to this day.
On the evening of August 2, 1944, the Nazis closed Sector BIIe or “Zigeunerlager” (“Gypsy camp”) at Auschwitz-Birkenau and brutally murdered thousands of Sinti and Roma in gas chambers in a single night. Today, in many countries, August 2 is commemorated as the International Day of Remembrance for the Victims of the Roma Genocide.
Roma and the Roma Community in Slovenia and Croatia in the 20th and Early 21st Centuries
Seminar for Educators, Synagogue Maribor, 13. 4. 2018
Zgodovina in razvoj romskih skupnosti v Sloveniji: življenje Romov nekoč in danes (Monika Sandreli)
Položaj Romov in Sintov na Slovenskem pred drugo svetovno vojno (dr. Andrej Pančur)
Genocid nad Romi (dr. Vera Klopčič)
Slovenski Romi v Auschwitzu (Boris Hajdinjak)
Žrtve revolucionarnega nasilja med Romi na Slovenskem (dr. Renato Podbersič)