Vezi raport EN

The issue of discrimination in Romania as reflected by international reports

(approximately 15% of the 13,200 inhabitants are Roma), the village of Toflea (approximately 5,000 of the 6,000 inhabitants are Roma), and the Postă neighbourhood in the city of Buzău, with several thousand Roma inhabitants. In all these cases, the outbreaks of Covid-19 were associated with the relatively high number of persons returning from abroad in the first days of the pandemic. There is no information on how many of these persons were Roma.

                                                                                                       Țăndărei case was the most visible at national
                                                                                                       level, due to the size of the town and to the fact
                                                                                                       that the lockdown decision was made by the
                                                                                                       Government, and not at the county level. The
                                                                                                       case is mentioned in the April 2020 report of
                                                                                                       the National Agency for Roma, which signals the
                                                                                                       prevalent narrative that Roma returning from
FRA - Implications of                          Lockdown                                                abroad are to be blamed for the outbreaks. The
COVID-19 pandemic                                                                                      situation in Țăndărei was presented in mass-me-
                                               In Romania, several localities were under lock-         dia in racial terms. The main narrative, initiated
on Roma and Travellers                         down, for various periods during the state of           by a news agency, was that 800 Roma have re-
communities                                    emergency and state of alert, to confine outbreaks      turned from abroad, brought the disease and are

                                               of Covid-19. Although there is no official data         refusing isolation, being a threat for everybody.
The report presents cases of discrimination    of the specific situation of Roma in these local-       The same narrative was presented on television,
regarding the implications of the measures     ities, there are a few cases where large Roma           including prime-time television, prompting a
adopted due to the COVID-19 pandemic on the    communities were obviously affected, as shown           public warning from the audio-visual arbiter,
Roma and travellers communities in Romania.    by media reports, such as the town of Țăndărei          National Audiovisual Council.

                                     ACTIVITY REPORT | 2020                                                                                          58