Hungary: Radicals protest "Romani crime", Romani people and their allies stand up to them

Reuters reports that several hundred adherents of the radical "Our Fatherland Movement" protested on Tuesday in the town of Törökszentmiklós, Hungary, east of Budapest, against what they called "Romani crime". Local Roma there assembled for a counter-demonstration that was supported by human rights activists and opposition politicians.
During their counter-protest, activists recalled the wave of racially-motivated attacks that swept through the country 10 years ago. Six Romani people died during those attacks and many more suffered serious injury.
The protests this week remained free of violence. The "Our Fatherland Movement" convened the protest in Törökszentmiklós in response to a recent incident in a local bar there.
A fight happened between non-Romani inhabitants and a Romani man, a video recording of which was massively disseminated on social media, including by the chair of the "Our Fatherland Movement", Laszlo Toroczkai, who began to discuss what he termed "gypsy terror" in association with the incident. Part of his protest was meant to be a march through the Romani part of Törökszentmiklós, but that was ultimately banned.
Despite the apprehensions of local Roma, the protests remained non-violent. Toroczkai established the "Our Fatherland Movement" last year after he failed to be elected chair of the Jobbik party, which in the past was infamous for, among other things, its strong anti-Romani position - the more centrist Tamás Sneider was elected instead.
Romani inhabitants of Törökszentmiklós reject the application of the principle of collective blame and see Toroczkai's moves as just an attempt for him to gain visibility ahead of the upcoming EP elections. "No such thing as collective crimes exists. Toroczkai just wants to attract former Jobbik voters," the Romani activist Lajos Balogh said.
Don't miss:
- Hungary: New Fascist party establishes paramilitary group
- Hungary: Mass demonstrations, protesters say PM endangers the rule of law
- Hungary: Roma Education Fund headquarters damaged by fire
- Hungarian Supreme Court says camerawoman who kicked asylum-seekers committed misdemeanor and can no longer be prosecuted
- Hungarian Scouts claim they did not discriminate against Romani applicants
- Hungarian Parliament approves law sanctioning NGOs, amends Constitution to prevent "foreign settlement"
- Hungary: Traffickers in human beings sentenced to 25 years for 71 deaths, prosecutor wants life sentences
- Hungary: József "Choli" Daróczi, translator of the New Testament into Romanes, has passed away
- Canada grants asylum to former MEP who faced death threats in Hungary due to her Romani origin
- Hungary: Open Society Foundation closing in Budapest due to Government persecution
- BBC Three Documentary Exposes Human Rights Abuses In Hungary’s State-Care Homes
- Hungarian pro-Government weekly publishes blacklist naming alleged "non-conformists"
- Hungary: Protests criticize Government, including over Roma integration
- Convicted German neo-Nazi who is a former Red Army Faction terrorist arrested in Hungary after seeking asylum
- Romania: Ethnic Hungarian mob commits arson against Romani children accused of stealing
- Hungary: Camerawoman gets three-year probation for kicking at migrants
- Hungarian PM attacks nonprofits supported by Soros, wants to close them
Related articles:
- Czech Police charge bodybuilder for praising Russia's invasion of Ukraine and expressing desire for a war in which he could kill anybody
- Czech ex-lawmaker gets six months, suspended for one year, for his remark about the WWII-era concentration camp for Roma at Lety u Písku
- German court sentences 93-year-old Holocaust denier to a year behind bars, she may appeal
- Slovak Supreme Court reduces politician's prison sentence for promoting neo-Nazism and paroles him, proceedings were disrupted by bomb threat
- Czech Constitutional Court rejects complaint from man responsible for desecrating memorial to the Holocaust and its Romani victims at Lety
- Czech Police investigate bodybuilder who made death threats against Roma for looking forward to "war in the Czech Republic"
- Czech extremist praises ombudsman for objecting to Ukrainian President Zelenskyy, deputy ombudswoman criticizes those objections
- The Times: Putin has sent mercenaries to Kyiv led by an admirer of the Nazis to murder Zelenskyy and the Klitschko brothers
- Czech Prosecutor-General says expressing approval and support for Russian attack on Ukraine could be a felony
- Czech Internet association finally blocks servers spreading disinformation about COVID-19, refugees and Roma - their pro-Kremlin disinformation was a step too far
- Czech disinformation scene sharing pro-Kremlin lies and propaganda, including from opposition and extremist politicians
- Bulgarian MEP infamous for anti-Roma rhetoric gives Nazi salute on the floor of the European Parliament