Brno, Czech Republic: Chair of Ukrainian Initiative lays flowers at remembrance site where young Romani man was stabbed to death
On Thursday, 15 June, representatives of the Ukrainian Initiative of South Moravia visited the site of last weekend's tragedy to lay flowers. Standing by the photo of the Romani youth who was stabbed to death, which is surrounded by many blazing candles, Ilnara Dudash, chair of the initiative, expressed her sincere condolences to the bereaved and to the entire Romani community.
Dudash called for people to remain calm and to prevent the escalation of violence. “A person lost his life, the worst thing that can happen. We Ukrainians are not indifferent to this. We sympathize with you. We do not want an escalation of violence, we do not want this tragic event to be considered an ethnic crime. We want to keep living in peace, friendship and understanding,” Dudash told the media who followed her visit to the remembrance site.
The chair of the initiative also told journalists that the police have not yet confirmed whether the foreign national suspected of having murdered the Romani man in Brno-Bystrc on Saturday is from Ukraine. “We do not have that information confirmed, not by the police and not by the Consulate of Ukraine. All we know is that the foreign national was 37 years old. We don’t know who the assailant was, we just know what has been made available from public sources of information,” Dudash added.
Last Saturday, ahead of the Ignis Brunensis fireworks festival at the Brno Reservoir, a 37-year-old foreign national, whom the media reported is a Ukrainian, stabbed two people during an altercation. A Romani youth subsequently died of those injuries in hospital.
News of his death has sparked a feeling of grievance among some Romani people and an anti-Ukrainian reaction. The Ukrainian Initiative of South Moravia previously issued a statement expressing regret for the death of the young person.
“We who are losing our loved ones, friends and fellow citizens on a daily basis know very well what it means to lose somebody close to you. We are immeasurably, sincerely distressed by your loss,” their statement said.
“Any violence is unacceptable and does not belong in a developed society. We condemn this tragic act and distance ourselves from any displays of hate. We believe in equality and humanity irrespective of nationality. In Brno, minorities have always lived in harmony, and we would like to maintain that mutual solidarity still. We consider it important not to perceive this sad event as a crime of ethnicity or of nationality,” added the Ukrainian Initiative, which also thanked residents of the City of Brno for their enormous aid and hospitality.
“As representatives of the Ukrainian minority speaking on behalf of everybody who has found refuge in Brno, we thank you for this and we ask everybody for restraint. We believe the investigation of this event will be properly undertaken. We are afraid the situation could be exploited to spark a wave of hatred against people from Ukraine. Most of them have already experienced a great deal of injustice when they were forced to flee their homes in the territories subjected to war, and any eventual wave of hatred here would be another great burden for them. Let’s not allow this incident to become a pretext for a conflict between nationalities that the extremists and those doing their best to stir up societal unrest will be glad to exploit,” the representatives of the Ukrainian Initiative of South Moravia said.
Representatives of both the Romani and the Ukrainian minorities also met in Brno yesterday at the Regional Police Directorate. “We discussed, for example, the disinformation being disseminated online, the commemorative ceremony planned for Saturday, and what we could do to calm these emotions,” Dudash told the press, adding that she understands the police decision not to publish any more information, that she believes there will be a fair investigation, and that she has faith in the Czech Republic’s judicial system.
