Czech nationalists want to relocate Romanies to India

The Czech National Party wants to succeed in the general elections in 2010 with radical anti-Romany rhetoric formulated in a 150-page study called "The Final Solution to the Gipsy Issue in the Czech Lands" that it will present in a month, Lidove noviny (LN) writes today.

The name evokes Nazi Germany and its final solution to the Jewish issue, but the nationalists claim they do no want to kill Romanies, but that they want to buy land in India and to relocate Romanies there, LN writes.

The team of the study authors is headed by party member Jiri Gaudin and party chairwoman Petra Edelmannova is also a member, according to party spokesman Pavel Sedlacek, LN writes.

The team was allegedly assisted by a few experts from "the academy environment," who, however, request anonymity, LN writes.

Ivan Vesely, chairman of the Romany association Dzeno, told LN that Romanies "have lived here for 500 years and we are still considered foreigners."

Sedlacek told LN the study looks at the Romany issue in a "comprehensive way – where it originated and why no one has as yet solved it."

He said the study concludes that repatriation is the sole possible solution after all other attempts to cope with the issue have failed.

"It must be solved on an all-European basis, land must be bought in India and the people must be given the opportunity to live on their land and according to their own ideas," LN quotes from the study.

Sedlacek said the word "final" that is connected with the study does not mean that the party would like to exterminate the Romanies, but because the matter should at last be tackled.

Miroslav Mares, expert in extremism, told LN that he thinks the nationalists will fail in the elections.

"The Romany issue is not that strong. According to public opinion polls strong anti-Romany prejudices do exist in society, but (Miroslav) Sladek who based his election campaign on anti-Romany rhetoric in 1998, failed," Mares said.

Sladek was then chairman of the extreme right Association for the Republic-Republican Party of Czechoslovakia (SPR-RSC).