May 15th
15-05-1998
May 15th
On its front page Zemske noviny focuses on a very different story. It describes the
decision by the city council in Usti nad Labem to build a high wall - almost completely
surrounding a mainly Romany housing estate as shocking. It goes on to look at the growing
tensions in the town between Romanies and their neighbours. In some form the story figures
in all the papers.
In Lidove noviny for example the spokeswoman of one Romany
organisation, the Romany Civic Initiative, compares the decision to the way that Jews were
shut into ghettos before the Second World War, and psychologist, Katerina Irmanova, warns
in Lidove noviny that a policy of encouraging separation between the two communities
will inevitably be counter-productive, and lead to heightened tensions.
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