Society
SWEDEN
Roma Family Trees Databased by the Swedish Police
By Emilio
In the southern part of Sweden in the
province of Skåne, thousands of roma
people have been registered in a police
database since 1996 because two big
families had a feud with each other. The
registration has been handed out to the
migration board and even small children
have been registered. This is a big
scandal and the minister of justice
B e a t r i c e A s k h a s a s ke d t h e r o m a
population for forgiveness. (http://
www.thelocal.se/50532/20131001/)
The police have admitted that this
situation has been handled badly and that
an investigation is now occurring. 4000
romas were registered in folders called
“itinerants” and there were family trees
and identification numbers also written
down. It is illegal to register people
because of ethnicity and another
investigation will reveal if registered
romas were discriminated.
Hundreds of people have called the police
to see if their names have been on the
list. It is possible to have the name
removed from the list if it is found on it.
Many roma youths have been encouraged
not to contact the police in the city of
Malmö and there is a great lack of trust
among the roma youths towards the
police. (http://www.dn.se/nyheter/
sverige/romer-uppmanas-undvikapoliskontakt/)
People who represent the roma
community are demanding an objective
investigation and that roma lawyers can
handle this case.
This registration incident will be
investigated by the police and many
romas have lost a lot of trust for the
police.
The United Nations is critical to how
Sweden deals with registration of
Romanians. The UN's anti-discrimination
Committee comes with sharp criticism
that Sweden does not react strongly
enough against marking and
discrimination against the registration of
Romains. It is the third time Sweden
receives criticism for the same thing and
yet has not sufficientl