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French Interior Minister: Romani integration not succeeding

15 March 2013
1 minute read

French Interior Minister Manuel Valls (Socialist Party) said today that Romani people coming to France from other EU states evidently do not want to integrate. In his view, the government’s efforts to facilitate housing and work for Romani immigrants have met with a lack of interest.

The government says its experience with so-called "integration villages" has shown that the vast majority of Romani campsite occupants do not want to integrate in France, either for cultural reasons or because they are in the hands of Romani networks that force them to beg or run prostitution rings. The minister wants to continue closing Romani campsites established in the vicinity of impoverished neighborhoods.

Valls said coexistence between locals and Romani migrants is so tense that it leads to violence. Since locals are afflicted by the economic crisis, Romani migrants are perceived as problematic.

"We estimate that there are now more than 400 campsites where approximately 20 000 Romani children, men and women, most of them from Bulgaria and Romania, are living completely illegally," Valls clarified in an interview with the right-wing daily Le Figaro. He intends to deport all Romani people who do not meet the conditions necessary for residency in France back to their countries of origin.

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