A thematic map on environmental racism against Roma communities in
Central and South-Eastern Europe developed by ENVJUSTICE – EJAtlas team
at ICTA - UAB in collaboration with European Environmental Bureau (EEB)
and Human Rights activists
[…].
Besides being present in Europe for centuries, Roma communities continue
to remain on the edge of both Eastern and Western European societies,
segregated apart from their neighboring communities. […]
This map provides a sample of the enormous environmental injustices that
Roma communities undergo due to their ethnicity and race in Europe –
today.
Only in Hungary there are 758 settlements identified at the outskirts of
the country in which Roma communities dominantly live. In Slovakia,
there are another 281 Roma settlements identified. About half of the 621
thousand Roma people live near or directly on landfills in Romania. In
Bulgaria 89% of Roma inhabitants do not have access to water; and in
Macedonia there are several cases reported where Roma are forcibly
evicted to live near heavily polluted industrial areas
[…].
Roma frequently face racism, intolerance, discrimination, and exclusion. […] Indeed, this thematic map confirms Roma settlements being placed near
mining and smelting complexes, former military bases, and landfills.
Furthermore, Roma settlements serve as deposits for highly dangerous
waste discharges from municipal, industries, and mine complexes.
Often,
environmental services, such as green areas or water sources, are used
as a direct strategy of racism practiced against Roma. For instance,
cutting-off water provisioning in the middle of a heat wave. Forced
evictions are also practiced against Roma in the name of green areas
restoration. Roma settlements are often segregated by physical walls
where local authorities claim it as a “noise barrier” to protect
citizens from the highway noise. On a daily basis, Roma experience a
strong hate speech and physical violence.
Poor health conditions of Roma relate to denial of potable water and
sanitation, polluted air, closeness to landfills, flooding sites. In
some cases, evictions to heavily polluted mining complexes or water
treatment plants expose Roma communities to lead poisoning and
radiation.
[…]
The research team consists of Ksenija Hanaček and Federico Demaria
(ICTA-UAB), Patrizia Heidegger and Katharina Wiese (EEB), Radost
Zahireva (Bulgaria), Mustafa Asanovski (Macedonia), Ciprian-Valentin
Nodis (Rumania), Zsuzsanna Kovács (Hungary), Ondrej Poduska (Slovakia).
—–
Map, captions, screenshots, and all text above from:
ENVJUSTICE – EJAtlas team
at ICTA - UAB. “Pushed to the wasteland: Environmental racism against Roma communities in Central and South-Eastern Europe.” Environmental Justice Atlas.
(If you visit their map online, every one of those listed instances of environmental racism contains photos of each site and specific details about each site, including: summary of the plight; satellite imagery of the landscape; assessment of the scale of the local environmental/health effects.)
