Victims of Nazism want Czechs to commemorate Romany Holocaust

International organisations of victims of Nazism today called on Czechs to commemorate the Romany victims from the Nazi Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia in a dignified way and criticised Prague for allowing a pig farm to be situated on the site of a former interment camp for Romanies.

The organisations have turned to Angela Merkel, chancellor of the EU presiding Germany, with a request to deal with the issue.

The pig farm in Lety near Pisek, south Bohemia, is situated on the site of the former wartime internment camp where hundreds of Romanies died and further hundreds were deported to extermination camps.

The appeal, issued in Berlin and addressed not only to Merkel but also to Czech PM Mirek Topolanek, has been issued by the international organisations of Oswiecim (Auschwitz) and Buchenwald concentration camps’ inmates along with the central council of German Romanies and Sints.

It has been joined by Cenek Ruzicka, head of the Czech committee for the compensation of the Romany Holocaust victims.

The current situation in Lety is shameful for a democratic country such as the Czech Republic, and it additionally humiliates the dead as well as the Holocaust survivors, says the appeal.

The appeal says that the South Bohemia region’s plan to build a memorial to the Romany victims near the pig farm is absolutely unacceptable. The pig farm must be removed as quickly as possible, it adds.

Noah Flug, chairman of the International Auschwitz Committee, said the signatories protest against such a situation. He said it is impossible for a pig farm to stand at a place where people died in the past.

Buchenwald prisoners’ committee deputy head Guenther Pappenheim said he considers the situation scandalous and untenable.

The organisations also demand the removal of a recreation centre situated on the site of another former wartime internment camp for Romanies, in Hodonin near Kunstat, north Moravia.

According to historical data, a total of 1,308 people were imprisoned in the Lety camp, where 327 people died and more than 500 were sent to the Auschwitz camp.

In Hodonin near Kunstat, 1,375 people were interned, 207 died and more than 800 were transported to Auschwitz.

Ruzicka today complained that no Czech government has found a solution that would satisfy the Czech Romany community.

Ruzicka criticised the fact that Czech officials put the financial aspect of the pig farm’s possible removal above the respect the Romany victims would deserve.

In 2005, the European Parliament passed a resolution asking the Czech Republic to abolish the pig farm in Lety.

Last summer the Czech government’s council for Romany affairs recommended that a foundation be established that would help the state buy out the pig farm and possibly also the recreation centre in Hodonin.

No solution has been reached so far, however, which the government explains by lack of money.

The previous socialist-led government estimated the costs of the farm’s removal at tens of millions of crowns at least.