France's Roma crackdown breaches EU law: MEPs
(BRUSSELS) - France has breached laws of the European Union by deporting hundreds of Roma migrants from Romania and Bulgaria, the Socialist bloc of the European parliament said on Thursday.
The parliament's second largest group urged the European Commission, the EU's executive arm, and the European Council, the body representing the bloc's 27 states, to condemn the French government's crackdown.
"The recent treatment of Roma people in France was appalling and cannot go unchallenged," Martin Schulz, head of the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats, said in a statement.
"Their rights have been abused for populist, electoral reasons by a government that is fast losing support," Schulz said.
The Socialists, following a similar call by the parliament's Liberal bloc, asked the commission and the council to issue a declaration on the issue at the legislature's next session in Strasbourg, which begins September 6.
The Socialists accused France of "breaching EU law" on the free movement of EU citizens.
"Scenes like those we have recently witnessed in France must never be repeated," Schulz said, urging the commission to implement an action plan to promote the inclusion of Roma in society.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy, citing concerns about crime, has ordered police to step up deportations of Roma from eastern Europe and to dismantle unauthorised Gypsy camps.
Since July 28, the French authorities have returned 681 people back to Romania and Bulgaria, which joined the EU in 2007, in a crackdown that has drawn fire from the left and right as well as the Vatican.
EU Justice Commission Viviane Reding expressed concern about the crackdown on Wednesday and said her office was analysing whether the French government's actions complied with EU law.
Under an arrangement to protect the labour market that expires in December 2013, France can expel Romanians and Bulgarians after three months in the country if they cannot show they have the financial means to stay.
Roma people living in the EU - guide
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France's Roma crackdown breaches EU law: MEPs
Commenting not about the actions of the French, but on the over-assertive response to the Roma deportations by EU Justice Commissioner Viviane Reding. Ian Dent points to the former role of Mrs Reding as the Commissioner for Information Society and Media, where she presided over a decision to wire-up a planned regionalised Europe in a multi-billion-Euro bid to impose new controls by the European Commission on the ways in which society is run. Without ANY public debate, these measures will significantly strengthen the power of the European Commission.
Ian Dent comments that plans are for an e-infrastructure which uses smart technologies and supercomputing to profile, track and control citizens in a bid to create a 21st century super economy. Run in partnership with global ICT companies, this massive programme - The Information Society - is the true hidden danger to human rights, not the actions of the French.
Ian Dent writes, There are very worrying civil liberty implications over the concept of infrastructure which are simply not being addressed. If Mrs Reding wants to discuss the Vichy-era, the rapid expansion of the civilian and military railway infrastructures in Germany during the first third of the 20th century led to a very efficient network being put in place which could even connect with technologies across borders. That same infrastructure within ten years became used to transport millions to their deaths. This is a warning from history that just because Commissioners, civil servants, computer programers and middleware developers ‘can’ do it, should they? Or at least, where is the public debate NOW, before it is too late? These systems will be in place and working in Europe from 2011. Perhaps Mrs Reding should examine the implications of her OWN actions, before pointing the finger.