Authorities Should Protect Vulnerable Communities

Brussels, 7 September 2009 – Kosovo and international authorities should act in concert to halt the recent wave of attacks and harassment targeting Roma communities, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International said today. The action should include both speedy investigations leading to identification and prosecution of the perpetrators and measures to prevent any future attacks.

BELGRADE, 2 September 2009 - Ambassador Hans Ola Urstad, the Head of the OSCE Mission to Serbia, welcomed today the Serbian Assembly's adoption of the new Law on National Councils of National Minorities.

31 august 2009 - The Roma families who lived in a ramshackle settlement under a Belgrade bridge have been relocated this Monday.
They left behind the remains of a dump that was piling up next to the settlement, dubbed "unhygienic", which the city services are now working to clean up.

In a decision made public on 11 August 2009, the Committee stated that the state has an obligation to ensure that educational materials do not reinforce demeaning stereotypes and perpetuate forms of prejudice which contribute to social exclusion, embedded discrimination and denial of human dignity. The Committee noted that statements found in the curriculum “…stigmatize homosexuals and are based upon negative, distorted, reprehensible and degrading stereotypes….”