Roma ethnics protest in Bucharest, requesting Romanian Foreign Affairs minister to resign

Several dozen people, representing the Roma minority in Romania, are protesting peacefully in Bucharest, in Piata Victoria, requesting Foreign Affairs minister Teodor Baconschi to resign, Romanian TV channel Realitatea TV. One week ago, the Romanian diplomacy chief talked with French European affairs minister Pierre Lellouche about the Romanian community from France and about the „crime issues” that the Romanian Roma minority bring.

• „In regards to the Romanian community from France, I know it well, as Romanian ex-Ambassador to Paris; it has good human and professional quality, which includes specialists in all areas, and an academic community made-up of 6,000 students in the great schools. We have physiological, natural issues, crime-related in the heart of some Romanian communities, especially among the Romanian Roma ethnics. Our position is clear: zero tolerance to crime and, at the same time, the wish to address this matter – namely migrant crime groups in France – in the spirit of the European law”, minister Baconschi said back then.

Later, Baconschi tried to „sweeten” his appreciation of the Roma ethnics. yesterday he spoke about how he had met a group of high educated Romas, and added: „You can call them anything but imbeciles”.

• „As presidential councillor, I met with a series of NGOs a few years ago and I realised: Romanian, born in Bucharest, went out on streets during the [1989] Revolution, on December 21, I have never met until then a Gypsy to whom to talk to. It is weird, but this proves that we are distant, that we do not join a dialogue, that we don’t know each other”, Baconschi said during a debate organised by Roma representatives in the Romanian Parliament.

• „I noticed this was a group of educated Roma, diploma earners. It was a pleasure because through your Indo-European origins, your cousins, your ancestors in the regions from where the Roma population came to Romania centuries ago, have filled the Silicon Valley with IT specialists. And I have often told my friends, speaking about this personal experience: ‘You can call them anything but imbeciles'”, Baconcshi added.

Talking about the Roma minority from Romania, Baconschi mentioned that education was essential and that „these qualities need to be refined, used and thus becoming a social capital, added value for a European and democratic Romania”.