Czech Interior Minister says he is concerned about the current Romani community tensions, police protect Roma just like everybody else

Rakušan stressed that the police are here to protect all citizens irrespective of ethnicity and will naturally also protect Romani people. He added that the laws of the country apply to everybody and naturally also apply to Ukrainians.

The Interior Minister also said he is in daily contact in that context with Czech Government Commissioner for Romani Minority Affairs Lucie Fuková and Czech Government Human Rights Commissioner Klára Šimáčková Laurenčíková. “There are people here who have long held prejudices against Romani people, they don’t like them. Most of those same people don’t like Ukrainians either. I have the feeling that those people are basically laughing the most over this,” he said in the interview.

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“I’ve said from the beginning, from the first seconds, that the police have to investigate everything clearly,” Rakušan said. “We are doing our best, at the Office of the Government, to facilitate various meetings where Romani people themselves will see we are concerned and that we will be protecting them the same way we protect anybody else.”

“It’s necessary that people feel you are protecting everybody in this society in the same way. Absolutely the same approach is needed, one that won’t discriminate and won’t give an advantage to anybody whatsoever. I believe that kind of work, when it is permanent, step by step, can somehow renew trust,” Rakušan said.

The minister said he is not interested in perpetrators’ skin color, sexual orientation or anything else, which is one reason why police are not communicating perpetrators’ identities. “I believe that in the absolutely same way they should never state that a person is explicitly Romani if somebody commits a crime. I would not want to burden the atmosphere in society, which is tense, with references to any group claiming that its members are violent or guilty of something,” said Rakušan, adding that this does not mean authorities want to cover up crimes committed by Ukrainians.

“The reason is so we do not stigmatize any group in the population, but at the same time – and this is the message I sent in the video I made addressing the Romani community – the laws of this country will apply to everybody, they have to, naturally also to Ukrainians, of course including those who came here to get away from the war,” explained Rakušan. He then clarified the rules on the possible deportations of those who are Ukrainian nationals and commit crimes in the Czech Republic.

“That’s not some kind of Czech achievement, it’s not that the Czechs have decided to be benevolent. What we have here is the institution of temporary protection, the European Union’s framework legislation, which applies to the entire EU, and it makes it impossible to send such people back to a country at war. However, that does not mean the person can’t be tried, convicted and sentenced in the Czech Republic,” Rakušan said during the interview.

The Interior Minister also said in the interview that he does understand Romani people’s lack of trust in the system and also understands their feeling that they are not getting the same chances as everybody else in society. “I believe the feeling that it’s not a level playing field is certainly justified, the feeling that chances aren’t equal, that there are prejudices here, that there is both latent and manifest racism in this society. That has causes that have long existed,” Rakušan said in his interview with Miko.

The first interviews of the Mikodrom program were filmed during June and July 2023 and currently their edited, shortened versions can be seen on its YouTube channel. They will soon be available through the platform Stream.cz as well; the full unedited interviews can be watched through the HeroHero platform.