An open-air exhibition entitled 'Berlin: City of Diversity' pays tribute to the city's diverse history. Credit: Francesca Dziadek/IPS

By Francesca Dziadek
BERLIN, Dec 7 2012 (IPS)

With a persistent undercurrent of discrimination against foreigners, ‘Gastarbeiter’ (guest workers) and citizens of colour, despite the fact that 20 percent of its population – roughly 16 million residents – are from an immigrant background, Germany is faced with the urgent task of rethinking its ambivalence towards diversity.

Demographic forecasts suggest that 25 percent of the population under 25 years of age are of immigrant descent. This group, increasingly referred to as the ‘new Germans’, are demanding visibility, representation and participation in social and political life, while an older generation of immigrants is quickly losing patience with the state’s inability to atone for racially motivated crimes and years of racial exclusion.

At an exhibition celebrating Berlin’s 775^th anniversary, entitled ‘Berlin: City of Diversity’, Turkish migrant workers – who spent their lives toiling day and night on the assembly lines of German industrial giants like Siemens and Telefunken – recalled being lured to the country during a labour shortage caused by the 1961 erection of the Berlin Wall.

Today, their grandchildren continue to grapple with German society’s age-old mentality that the “boat is already full”.

After the fall of the Wall in 1989, ‘integration’ became the rallying cry of German reunification. But as East and West Berlin collapsed into one another’s arms, less visible minorities – like the Vietnamese ‘boat people’ in the west and contract workers in the east – found themselves facing a double hurdle, with a glass wall of access and inclusion proving tougher to dismantle than the cement one.

“I never liked the word ‘integration’,” Hatice Akyün, a popular German-Turkish columnist for Berlin’s daily ‘Der Tagesspiegel’ and winner of Berlin’s 2011 Integration Prize, said on public radio. “It begs the question: who is integrating who, how and why?”

In 2005, in response to concerns that an ageing population and a low birth rate threatened to skew the country’s demographics, Germany revised its immigration law, stretching entry criteria to include highly skilled professionals, granting foreign graduates from local universities a year to search for work and welcoming self-employed immigrants.

Shortly after the reforms were enacted, the far-right National Socialist Underground (NSU) terror cell shot their third victim, a 50-year-old Turkish food vendor in Nuremberg named Ismail Yasar, in a series of murders between 2000 and 2006.

Akyün personally experienced this frightening escalation of the profiling of Turkish citizens as Islamists.

“The lowest point for me was around the time of the ‘Sarrazin debate’,” she told IPS, referring to the surge of Islamophobia and populist demagoguery that followed the publication of Thilo Sarrazin’s ‘Germany is doing away with itself’ in 2010.

The book, which quickly became the most popular piece of literature in decades, selling 1.5 million copies, exposed a deep anti-migrant sentiment in German society.

According to Dilek Kolat, senator for work, integration and women, who spoke at the recent ‘Diversity 2012’ conference sponsored by Germany’s Diversity Charter, “a Turkish name and photograph in a job application still reduces an applicant’s chances by 14 percent”.

Kolat pleaded for a concrete, top-down process to implement an agenda of equal opportunities and social inclusion, such as her brainchild ‘Berlin needs you’, a campaign designed to attract minority applicants into the public sector.

“A neutrality approach is no longer relevant or helpful,” said Kolat in an address to human resources personnel and diversity managers from all over Germany.

Unsurprisingly, corporations have been among the most active proponents of a self-regulating policy on diversity, as large companies eye new global markets.

“Diversity is our daily bread, our key strategic approach as a global player,” Ederer said. “A diverse workforce simply makes economic sense…mixed teams are more effective problem-solvers.”

According to the federal ministry of labour and social affairs, Germany is looking at a labour shortfall of six million workers by 2025.

In response to this looming crisis, the EU Blue Card for immigration came into effect this August, along with the Welcome to Germany portal, a project of the Qualified Professionals Initiative that “bundles together all the key information about making a career and living in Germany”.

Germany’s public sector also needs to urgently address diversity within its ranks. With only 13 percent of employees from minority backgrounds, data from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) shows that Germany is lagging behind France and the UK’s 20 percent.

“The police force still has no diversity strategy to speak of, the dominant approach is assimilationist – awareness of difference is not part of the mindset and it is my goal to change this,” Margarete Koppers, Berlin’s deputy police superintendent, told IPS.

Her comments come at a critical time, when the entire police apparatus is under close scrutiny for failing to book those responsible for the NSU’s nine “serial” murders of migrant shop owners from September 2000 to August 2006.

Experts claim this amounts to an acceptance of pervasive structural racism, and that a formal acknowledgement, along the lines of the UK’s MacPherson report of 1994, is long overdue in Germany.

Kien Nghi Ha, a professor at Tübingen University, arrived in the country as one of the so-called ‘boat people’ of 1979.

In his study on Asian-German relations, Kien recalls a painful moment that defined his childhood: an attack on a Hamburg refugee asylum that left two young Vietnamese refugees, aged 18 and 22 years, dead in August of 1980.

No formal enquiry ensued and no statistical information was ever filed. The murders were not even registered under the politically motivated criminality (PMC) category.

Acknowledging these past crimes will be a crucial step in moving towards a more diverse and inclusive Germany.

(END)

Francois Hollande, a frontrunner in the upcoming French presidential election, claims his "real political adversary is the world of finance." Credit: Jean-Marc Ayrault/CC-BY-2.0

By Julio Godoy
BERLIN, Mar 20 2012 (IPS)

Practically all European Social Democratic and Socialist parties are supporting the French presidential candidate François Hollande in the upcoming elections, in the hope that his likely triumph against incumbent president Nicolas Sarkozy will create enough continental momentum to put an end to the present Conservative-inspired social and economic austerity policies.

According to the most recent polls, Hollande is likely to win the French presidential elections scheduled for April and May, with some polls released on Mar. 19 indicating that he could overcome Sarkozy with some 55 percent of the votes in the second round slated for May 5.

On Mar. 17, leaders of practically every European Social Democratic and Socialist party – all of which attach fundamental importance to the French presidential elections to define the middle term European economic and social future – gathered in Paris to participate in a rally to support Hollande.

Such united backing for the frontrunner who claims that his “true adversary is finance” comes at a time when the question of social justice in Europe has become more pressing than ever. Youth unemployment has reached record summits in debt-ridden Spain and Greece, and in Portugal the death rate of elderly is reaching historic heights.

As Stefan Ulrich, correspondent of the German daily newspaper Die Sueddeutsche Zeitung in France, commented on the weekend Leftist summit in Paris, “Europe has forgotten its own children. That’s why the Left believes its hour has come.”

Additionally, all three Mediterranean countries and Italy are trapped in a severe economic recession, aggravated by the austerity programmes imposed by the European Union and the international financial institutions.

This fiscal and growth conundrum makes the possibility that these countries can improve their budget situations and economic capacities while simultaneously reducing their debts highly unlikely.

The macroeconomic landscape also reflects the rising income inequality across the continent. The present salaries of top business executives remain astronomically high when compared to the income of an average employee in the EU, while taxes paid by large private companies are at an all time low, especially for banks and investment funds.

In Germany, for instance, the local press just revealed that Martin Winterkorn, CEO of automaker Volkswagen, received a salary of 17.4 million euros last year.

Against this backdrop, Hollande’s programme of higher taxes for the wealthy, tighter regulation for private financial institutions, and more public spending on youth employment and education strategies looks increasingly like a Social Democratic ‘new deal’ for Europe.

“The French presidential election is the point of inflexion in European politics,” said the former Italian leftist Prime Minister Massimo D’Alema during the weekend rally to support Hollande.

“First we (Leftist parties) will take France, then we will take Europe,” Johannes Swoboda, Austrian leader of the Social Democratic group at the European Parliament, predicted at the rally.

“We (European Leftist parties) will collectively change Europe,” insisted Sigmar Gabriel, president of the German Social Democratic Party (SPD), at the same occasion.

European Leftist support for Hollande is a reaction to the European Conservative electoral support for Sarkozy, and aims at changing the austerity programmes, in particular the so called fiscal pact, imposed upon Mediterranean governments allegedly to “master” their sovereign debt crises.

This Conservative electoral backing for Sarkozy was best expressed by German chancellor Angela Merkel, who in a recent television interview in Paris said, “I support (Sarkozy) in whatever he does.”

Both Merkel and Sarkozy, in cooperation with the International Monetary Fund and the European Union, were pivotal in conceiving and implementing the severe austerity programmes unleashed on Greece, Spain and Portugal during the past two years. The two leaders were also instrumental in drafting and implementing the so-called European fiscal pact.

Hollande is the one European Socialist leader who has expressed open and vehement opposition to such programmes. During his electoral campaign, Hollande pledged to renegotiate the European fiscal pact, which foresees a public debt limit for the whole of Europe, but no increase in public revenues, in the form of tax reforms.

In a programmatic speech last January, Hollande went as far as to say that his “real political adversary is the world of finance … which over the past 20 years has taken control of our economy, our society, and our lives.”

In that speech, Hollande denounced conventional neoliberal attempts to revive the economy, which has been in shambles since the outbreak of the global financial crisis in 2007.

He stressed that the only tangible result of various global and European summits, other than aggravating the abject living conditions of the poor, was that “private banks, first bailed out by the state, are now biting the hand that once nourished them.”

Besides new rules for banks and investment funds, Hollande has also promised a wealth tax of 75 percent, to pay for new public spending in youth employment and education, and a reversal of the rise of the pension age, a Sarkozy-sponsored reform.

The Social Democratic opposition parties in Italy and Germany would indeed benefit from Hollande’s electoral victory. In both countries, general elections are scheduled for 2013. However, both parties must face strong incumbent candidates.

In Germany, conservative Chancellor Merkel still enjoys a great deal of popularity after six years in office, despite numerous setbacks in her political and economic programmes or backlash from her choices in political personnel.

At the same time, the German SPD has not yet fully recovered from the dramatic loss of favour it suffered during its past reign (1998-2005), during which it adopted radical cuts in welfare and pension programmes, and a vast deregulation of the labour market, measures that provoked a widening of income disparities, leading to what social scientists call “the oligarchisation of German society.”

D’Alema, who is likely to lead the Leftist opposition coalition in Italy in the 2013 elections, must also confront the incumbent Prime Minister Mario Monti, who, despite the austerity programmes imposed since last fall, enjoys a good deal of popular support.

A triumph for Hollande in France next May, coupled with victory for the SPD in Germany (most likely in coalition with the Green party) and success for the Leftist coalition in Italy next year, would mean that the most important countries in the European monetary union would cease to be ruled by Conservatives.

The three countries could then join forces with other Leftist governments in Belgium, Denmark, Austria, Slovenia, and Slovakia to form a kind of balanced, united front against the conservative governments in the rest of Europe, in particular in Britain, Finland, Ireland, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Spain and Sweden.

Excerpt:

By Pavol Stracansky and - -
PRAGUE, Mar 9 2012 (IPS)

Just days after a hotel was firebombed in a suspected racist attack, experts and activists have warned of neo-Nazi groups turning to ‘terrorist’ campaigns as they become increasingly influenced by far-right movements in other countries.

They say that extremist groups in countries such as Russia, Italy and Germany are providing Czech right- wing movements with operational, organisational and ideological inspiration and support for racial violence and ways of gaining public support.

Gwendolyn Albert, a prominent anti-racism campaigner in the Czech Republic, told IPS: “It is an established fact that the Czech and German ultra-right parties have entered into cooperation agreements.

“The Czechs now seem to be following German tactics of having a relatively mainstream-looking, officially registered political party hold public rallies which those ideologically committed to racist violence then attend in hopes of actually carrying out that violence.”

Albert, who works for the Romea Roma rights and education group, added: “The impact of Russian fascist and ultra-nationalist ties can also be seen in cases where ultra-right demonstrators turn out to be para- militarily organised to take on the police.”

The warnings come after the Interior Ministry last week released a report on the far-right in the country which said a rise in racially motivated attacks in the coming years was likely partly because of the influence of foreign right-wing extremist groups who use violence and terrorism, especially those in Russia.

Russian neo-Nazis have been linked to terror campaigns such as attacks on and the murder of judges who have sentenced right-wing fanatics and activists.

Some expert witnesses in similar trials in the Czech Republic say they have also faced threats and intimidation, and just last week sentencing in the trial of a suspected racist attacker had to be postponed because of a bomb threat.

German neo-Nazi groups also have a proven history of terrorism. It was recently discovered that a neo- Nazi cell in Germany calling itself the National Socialist Underground was responsible for the killings of a nine immigrants and a policewoman over a six-year period, as well as bank robberies and bomb attacks.

Meanwhile, former German neo-Nazis have publicly said that there is strong cooperation between German and Czech right wing groups and that firearms training camps for neo-Nazis from across Europe have been held by German right-wing groups on Czech territory.

The author of the Interior Ministry report, Miroslav Mares, said neo-Nazi gangs were increasingly ‘arming’ themselves.

He said they are gaining access to weapons and firearms training by infiltrating the police force and private security services, allowing them to get gun licences and, in some cases, training in combat situations.

In one example of how far such groups have already gone in ‘arming’ themselves, following one recent far-right rally, local media reported that extremists had been carrying explosives which are only available to the military.

The fears of a surge in racist violence come against a backdrop of racial trouble in socially deprived areas of the country.

Last year there were mass protests and violence in the Sluknov district in the northern Czech Republic after a wave of attacks and crime which locals blamed on the Roma.

Some commentators have put the increased tensions down to growing economic hardship.

Anti-racism monitors across Europe have reported a rise in anti-immigrant and anti-minority sentiment since the start of the financial crisis in 2008, and the Interior Ministry report cited worsening economic conditions and increasing social exclusion as other drivers of the predicted rise in racial attacks.

But Mares, a sociologist, pointed out that a fertile breeding ground for anti-minority violence was being created by some local mainstream politicians.

He told local media: “What we are seeing is the rise of ‘common’ racism. In socially troubled areas we can see the involvement of the regular population in anti-Roma demonstrations and the neo-Nazis are the ‘drivers’ of anti-Roma activities and prejudices.

“We can now hear racist statements from local politicians from non-extremist parties. Because some traditional parties now use anti-Roma rhetoric it could be the backdrop for more militant activities by neo- Nazis.”

The far-right is trying to capitalise on this anti-minority sentiment. Over the last decade much of the Czech far-right has made a clear effort to distance itself from the “skinhead” image it had previously and present itself as a viable political alternative.

The Workers’ Social Justice Party is now the political voice of the far-right, and specifically plays on anti- Roma prejudices.

Experts say that extremists are also adopting tactics of gaining supporters by promoting their opposition not just to Roma but to immigration in general and to controversial issues such as same-sex marriage.

International anti-racism groups have said the situation will only be improved if politicians set a strong anti-racism example and legislation is enacted to strengthen legal deterrents to racism.

Georgina Siklossy, press officer at the Brussels-based pan-European anti-racism group the European Network Against Racism, told IPS: “Politicians first and foremost have a responsibility not to use hate speech which could incite racist attacks and contribute to anti-minority sentiment.

“Czech authorities can also take concrete measures to combat rising right-wing extremist groups, for example making sure legislation is implemented criminalising racism.”

Mares said that prevention programmes in schools are essential if the situation is to change.

But Roma themselves are more pessimistic. There have been a string of arson attacks in recent years on Roma, one of which in 2009 left a two-year old baby disabled for life. And in the last six months there have been 23 reported racist attacks on Roma which left three people dead.

Emil Vorac, head of a Roma NGO which works in As town where just last week a hotel with Roma families living in it was firebombed, told local media such attacks were to be expected.

“This was not unexpected because it seems to me that racism and xenophobia are rising here and the situation is getting worse. That’s my experience of working in various commissions and committees in this region. Their members behave like xenophobes in many cases.”

Excerpt:

By Vesna Peric Zimonjic and - -
BELGRADE, Mar 7 2012 (IPS)

Serbia has reached its historic goal of becoming a European Union (EU) member candidate after being a pariah state for years. But analysts warn that the undisputed political success may not bring immediate results.

Many obstacles remain on the road to becoming an EU member by way of tuning laws to match EU legislation, and eradicating corruption and organised crime.

A survey by the Serbian European Integration Office (SEIO), the government body for EU integration, also shows that Serbia is deeply split over EU membership, with 51 percent of citizens supporting it. This is the lowest level of support in 12 years since the downfall of former president Slobodan Milosevic.

“People are more sceptical than the politicians,” analyst Srdjan Bogosavljevic told IPS. “If one could tell them in 2000 that EU membership means salvation for the economy, they know it’s not the case now.”

Analyst Djordje Vukadinovic says Serbs are looking closely at nearby Greece, where half a million among a Serbian population of seven million spend their summers.

“Irresponsible politicians presented the EU, in the past, as the beacon of development,” Vukadinovic told IPS. “Since Greece has fallen into debt, and news on brutal bailout methods has been all over the media, scepticism is normal. The main question is – what is the price ordinary people have to pay.”

Economist say the candidate status brings Serbia closer to the Instrument for Pre-Accession Assistance (IPA) funds that could bring 200 million euros (265 million dollars) in investment.

“Forty million euros (53 million dollars) are ready to be invested into agriculture from 2014,” agriculture minister Dusan Petrovic told journalists. “It does not seem so much now, but bearing in mind that agriculture is the most successful production activity, this means a real boost.”

Agriculture is the only profitable export, earning 2.4 billion dollars in 2011. The growth rate in agriculture has been between 18 and 27 percent over the past decade.

The biggest opponents of EU membership are hard-line nationalists who want to keep traditional values and the Serb identity alive. For them, steps that bring Serbia closer to the EU mean loss of national identity and submission to the West.

Vojislav Kostunica, leader of the Democratic Party of Serbia (DSS), and prime minister for 2004-2008 has said this is not a moment for celebration. “Who can celebrate the candidacy now?” he said in a statement. “People who have no jobs, who have become very poor…Status represents an empty word with the high price paid.”

Kostunica was referring to Serbia’s agreement last week that Kosovo, its breakaway province, could have full representation in international meetings, despite the fact that Serbia opposes the unilateral declaration of independence of Kosovo in 2008.

“In order to get the candidate status, we had – de facto and de jure – to recognise the independence of Kosovo,” deputy leader of the nationalist Serbian Radical Party Dragan Todorovic said in a statement. “Stories of economic prosperity with the EU membership candidacy are just empty talk.”

Belgrade University professor Zarko Korac believes “there is little will for change.”

“There was and there remains in Serbia the constant battle between the conservatives that don’t want to change anything, and progressives who want improvement and change,” Korac told IPS. “This is the case now, again. The bad thing is that the former are very strong, like the Serbian Orthodox Church, for example.”

“Things will change (with the candidacy), of course,” Korac added, “But not as much, as fast, as many would like.”

Excerpt:

By Claudia Ciobanu and - -
WARSAW, Mar 3 2012 (IPS)

Despite pushes from international bodies such as the United Nations (UN) or the European Union (EU) to promote gender equality in Central and Eastern Europe, access to funding for such initiatives remains largely conditional upon national governments’ willingness to embrace this agenda.

Immediately after the fall of communism in 1989, Central and Eastern European (CEE) NGOs working on gender equality got most of their funding from U.S. or Western European private foundations or governmental agencies; following these countries’ entry to the EU, non-EU donors withdrew considering the region well covered by EU funds.

CEE NGOs, however, noted that following EU accession, it has become ironically more difficult to access funding, primarily because EU funds must generally be co-financed from national budgets and also get distributed according to priorities set at the national level. As a consequence, NGOs find themselves limited by their governments’ agendas that are not always progressive.

“Before EU accession it was paradoxically easier to get money for more radical actions and publications,” says Alina Synakiewicz from Polish NGO Feminoteka. “Now, even though money is available, it is given out via governmental intermediation, meaning that the government channels it the way it wants.”

In the best case, NGOs “get creative” and manage to fit their priorities into the governmental agenda; in the worst, they are simply denied funding for themes deemed unacceptable.

The most striking example of such marginalisation of a core gender equality theme as a result of a conservative national agenda concerns reproductive rights in Poland. In 1993, abortion was made illegal in this country and, to date, access to contraceptives and sexual education is limited, and doctors are free to invoke a “conscience clause” to refuse writing prescriptions for birth control. Gender equality activists argue that such limitation of reproductive rights in the country is primarily caused by the strong hold that the Polish Catholic Church has on both the state and society as a whole.

Last year, activists attempted to introduce a reproductive rights bill in the parliament, having as main points the legalisation of abortion, making contraceptives affordable and more accessible, introducing fact-based sexual education in schools, and state support for in-vitro fertilisation.

Their effort to gather the 100,000 signatures needed to bring the civic law proposal into the legislative failed because of a media blackout on the initiative alongside a lack of funds and help for the activists. Even some NGOs working on women’s issues steered away from supporting this effort as they did not trust the initiative can succeed.

“What has unfortunately changed in the last 20 years in Poland is that the whole public space is dominated by the terminology propagated by the Church,” says Elżbieta Korolczuk, one of the activists promoting the initiative. “Not only the general public but quite a big part of our activist circles do not believe it is possible to change the law when it comes to reproductive rights in Poland in the foreseeable future.” Korolczuk, however, says the fight will continue, even in such an unfavorable climate.

And, across CEE, gender equality activists are winning battles every day regardless of resistance or indifference from national authorities.

Some of the most difficult themes to address across the region over the past two decades have been violence against women and domestic violence. Funding from national sources remains scarce for groups working on violence against women which results not only in limited NGO capacity – highly problematic considering that it is NGOs that do most of the work on this issue — but also in an insufficient number of shelters for victims of violence.

Legislation regarding domestic violence has also advanced with fits and starts. Most CEE countries have passed such laws, yet often the texts lacked provisions for imposing restraining orders on the aggressors; arguably, this reluctance has to do with a “sanctification” of private property across the region after 1989 and hence an unwillingness to take men (usually the aggressors) out of their homes (of which often they are the owners).

But this week (Feb. 28), following over two years of intense campaigning by NGOs, the Romanian parliament finally introduced an amendment in the national legislation regulating the use of restraining orders against the perpetrators of domestic violence.

Two years back, Cristina Horia from Sensiblu Foundation, one of the main groups working on domestic violence in Romania and organiser of a strong public campaign on the theme in 2009, was telling IPS that “the involvement of state institutions with the issue of domestic violence is limited, being at most supporters and partners, but not initiating campaigns.”

Over the past two years, Horia says, national and local authorities have improved their attitudes, yet “systematic gaps” continue to prevent a proper engagement with domestic violence.

Among these gaps, Horia lists “the under-financing of the social assistance system, the insufficient number of shelters for battered women, the lack of a national strategy to address domestic violence, the authorities’ failing to assume the role of protecting victims and to implement measures to punish aggressors, insufficient training of the police and public services staff to deal competently with victims and aggressors.”

There is a sense that NGOs active in CEE are operating in quite a different reality than that described by their national authorities in reports to international bodies, full of good intentions and commitments to gender equality.

A possible test of this statement could be to look at how one of the most advanced gender mainstreaming tools proposed by the UN, gender budgeting, fares in the region. Gender budgeting means analysing and transforming national and local budgets in such a way that they allow for the advancement of women or at least that obstacles to gender equality are eliminated. It does not mean giving more money for women, but rather, using existing resources more cleverly.

According to economist Elizabeth Villagomez, who has worked for years with various UN agencies on training and assessing possibilities of introducing this tool in CEE, “gender budgeting is not strong in these countries because the idea and principles of gender equality are still weak there; in former communist countries, the idea of equality as a value in general, including when it comes to gender, is not yet very much welcomed or still misunderstood because of the recent socialist past.”

Gender budgeting has been attempted in several places across the region, from municipalities in Poland (Gdansk) and Albania (Elbasan), to the national level in the Czech Republic, but its implementation remains patchy and has not brought the results seen in the West. Villagomez adds another reason for this lack of success: “using gender budgeting depends on the real capacities of governments to use results-based budget management and also on how the political priorities reflected in the budgets are set.”

Excerpt:

In an uncharacteristically lively election campaign in this nation of five million people, Finns head for the polls in a second round of voting Sunday to elect a new president.

None of the eight presidential candidates emerged as clear winner in the first round of voting last month, hence the second round.

Sauli Niinistö, 64, of the conservative National Coalition Party who was tipped as favourite won 37 percent of the vote n the first round while Pekka Haavisto, 53, of the Green League caused a major upset by unexpectedly coming second with 18.8 percent.

With intensive use of social media such as Facebook, flashmob stunts and live music concerts, this year’s campaign has been more lively than previous ones. But voter turnout of 72 percent is still lower than the 74 percent six years ago.

The contest in the second round is now between Niinistö, a former finance minister and speaker in parliament in the last government, and Haavisto, former development cooperation minister and special EU representative to Darfur, Sudan. Niinistö lost in the second round in 2006 when outgoing President Tarja Halonen won her second term.

Polls published here Wednesday indicate that Niinistö is the clear frontrunner predicted to win 62 percent of the vote while Haavisto is expected to take 38 percent.

Jan Sundberg, professor of political science in the University of Helsinki says that the gap between the candidates will narrow in the final stages, though he concedes that Haavisto is the underdog.

“Niinistö has more resources and more people working for him, so it is clear that Haavisto is the underdog, added to the fact that he is gay which is a problem for most conservative and older people,” Sundberg told IPS.

Haavisto has been living in a registered partnership with an immigrant from Ecuador. For some voters this may be a problem, but it never developed into an election issue. His vote of nearly 19 percent far exceeded the overall national support for his party.

The contest between Haavisto and Niinistö brings the curtain down on 30 years of domination of the Social Democratic Party in Finnish presidential politics, starting with Mauno Koivisto in 1982 and followed by Nobel laureate Martti Ahtisaari and Tarja Halonen, the first female president in 2000.

The Social Democrats candidate, former prime minister Paavo Lipponen, faced a stunning defeat, picking up only 6.7 percent of the vote in the first round. This surprised people even outside his party.

An equally surprising early exit in the race was former foreign minister and Eurosceptic Paavo Väyrynen of the Centre Party, who was earlier tipped to win second place but was edged out in a last-minute surge for Haavisto.

Political analysts here say Väyrynen’s vigorous campaign, coupled with his anti-European stand, drew voters away from the anti-immigrant and populist True Finns Party whose phenomenal success in last year’s parliamentary elections rocked the Finnish political establishment. The party leader and presidential candidate Timo Soini finished in fourth place with only 9 percent of the vote.

Hopes for a female candidate to continue outgoing Tarja Halonen’s 12-year presidency were extinguished in the first round when the only two female candidates, Eva Biaudet of the Swedish People’s Party (RKP) and Sari Essayah of the Christian Democrats got only 2.7 and 2.5 percent respectively.

Political analysts here have observed that Sunday’s vote will be historic in the sense that for the first time it has not shaped into a battle between left and right as in all previous direct-election presidential campaigns.

Until now, the second round of voting has always pitted a candidate of the Social Democrats or a common champion of the left against a representative of the non-socialist camp.

The Finnish president no longer has a say in domestic policy which is mainly the responsibility of the parliamentary government. Constitutional amendments within the last decade have whittled down the powers of the president. Presidential powers are now limited to foreign policy and defence, exercised in conjunction with the government.

The two candidates do not differ significantly in their foreign policy views, according to Sundberg.

Haavisto, says Sundberg, is as a member of the Green Party more concerned with international environmental issues, conflict resolution and development assistance. Niinistö is more of an establishment figure whose views on Finland’s relations with the European Union are more in line with the current government.

“Whatever the case, the candidates are not going to be elected based on their foreign policy views but rather on their profiles and personal issues and what people think about how they can fit into the position,” says Sundberg.

“I had to fight to be treated like a human, not animal,” dissident Nikolai Avtukhovich wrote from prison. Last month Avtukhovich, Belarusian political activist and entrepreneur, convicted to five years in the penal colony for illegal storage of five cartridges for a hunting rifle, cut his veins.

The reason for such a dramatic move may seem trivial: he was put into one cell with homosexuals.

But the subculture of Belarusian prisons is brutal: gays and rapists are at the very bottom of the hierarchy. They are obliged to announce their status to the fellowship when they arrive in a new place so that other inmates will not lose their status coming in contact with them.

Prisoners are told they must not shake their hand, eat with them, nor stay in one room. Otherwise you could become “dirty” too; then the “clean” fellows may harass or beat you.

So Avtukhovich went for self-mutilation to get moved out of those cells. Soon after recovering from cutting his veins, Avtukhovich was on Jan. 17 found guilty of “malicious abuse of the colony regime” and ordered to be transferred to a high-security indoor jail, where conditions of confinement are much more severe.

In the penal colony convicts live in the barracks, able to spend free time outdoors. In closed jail they are cramped in the cells, and entitled only to a one-hour walk round a tiny yard. They have a right only to short visits and a food parcel not more than once a year.

Andrei Sannikov, the most serious rival to president Alexander Lukashenka in the 2010 election, serving five and a half years, faced similar issues. When an “untouchable” prisoner was allocated to his solitary cell, Sannikov immediately called hunger strike and stood close to the door. The new inmate was taken away within minutes.

“We have not witnessed that before: prison administration using the informal order to humiliate jailed dissidents,” journalist and former prisoner of conscience Andrzej Poczobut told IPS.

It is neither the prison administration nor the judiciary who call the shots. According to Poczobut “all decisions regarding political prisoners are taken at the high level, usually by KGB.” KGB is an acronym for the Committee for State Security.

“The regime is open in its intention: to break the dissidents, make them beg for mercy,” Poczobut said. Last summer this journalist from Grodno got a suspended sentence of three years for insulting Lukashenka. He was released after three months detention.

“Initially the investigators tried to intimidate me, but overall I was not treated badly,” Poczobut said. “They knew I was a journalist, ready to report any mistreatment abroad. And unlike most of the other inmates, I was conscious of my rights, having printed prison regulations with me.”

Prisoners seen as troublemakers are more prone to harassment and punitive measures. From day one in jail Avtukhovich helped other prisoners write complaints, then went on hunger strike to protest the refusal of medical assistance.

A week before Avtukhovich, Nikolai Statkevich, another former candidate for presidency in Belarus, was also sentenced to more rigorous imprisonment. He is serving six years for organising “anti-state riots” (means the demonstrations against election rigging).

Statkevich was declared by officials to be a “malicious violator” of the order who has refused to follow the path of correction. “He is seeking no early release on parole, but is going to wait till the end of his sentence and lead a criminal lifestyle in the future.”

According to his wife, the politician was accused of failing to carry a prisoner’s number tag on his clothes, and for failing to list handkerchiefs among his personal belongings.

Most of the 800 people arrested a year ago following after-election protests have been set free. President Lukashenka left eight of his enemies behind bars, the most high profile and as the regime sees it, unrepentant.

“This is the personal vengeance of Lukaskenka,” Ales Kirkievich, one of the leaders of the anti-regime Youth Front told IPS. Asked about his own treatment in jail, Kirkievich said it was “not as bad as in the 1930s, but certainly far from EU standards.”

Arrested in January 2011, and sentenced to four years of penal colony, Kirkievich was released in September after applying for a presidential pardon.

That is exactly what Lukashenka wants. “They hope to come out of jail as heroes. No way,” the President said recently, responding to questions about political prisoners.

Last September Uadzimir Kobiets, staff member of Sannikov’s presidential campaign, gave public testimony about his stay in a KGB prison on the Charter97.org website.

“Masked KGB officers armed with batons and paralysers abused us, made us run on steep stairs while handcuffed, do squats, forced us to undress, then to stand naked with feet wide apart for a long time. I felt pain, but must not move – otherwise the oppressors kicked and beat me.”

The worst was mental torture. Interrogators told Kobiets that the fate of his wife and children depended on his behaviour. “I thought I was in a hopeless situation. This lawlessness was suffocating, there was no one I could address,” he wrote.

Kobiets signed a collaboration agreement and got out of jail.

His testimony confirms Kiril Semianchuk’s story. In March this opposition activist from Grodno applied for political asylum in Poland, saying he suffered from beating and sleep deprivation in KGB custody.

“During the interrogation, KGB officers beat me with shoes filled with gravel, one of them strangling me. I was punched in the face, and my head would hit the wall,” Semianchuk told Belsat TV.

After a whole night of such interrogation, the politician agreed to appear on public television and express views critical of the opposition. He also signed an agreement to cooperate with the KGB. “They showed me a small plastic bag with white powder and threatened to plant it on me, so that I could be sentenced to 10 years,” he added.

The government in Minsk denies allegations of torture and ignores repeated calls from the EU and the U.S. to release all political prisoners.

For more than a week, thousands have been demonstrating in cities across Romania. Participants from all walks of life bring to the fore the broadest array of demands in what looks like a celebratory discovery of street protest. The main call is against lack of transparency and accountability in decision-making.

In 2009, Romania’s centre-right government contracted a 20 billion euro loan from the IMF; the government then adopted one of the toughest austerity packages seen in Europe, centered around 25 percent reductions in state salaries and cuts in social assistance.

What sparked the protests was a draft law to privatise the health system presented by Romanian President Traian Basescu in early January, authored by a presidential commission without public debate. The draft proposed that all medical insurance packages including basic universal coverage be managed by private funds and that emergency services be opened up to private providers.

This prompted Secretary of State Raed Arafat, the creator of an efficient ambulance system (SMURD) functional in many Romanian towns, to argue that the implementation of the new law would destroy SMURD.

For a demoralised people, this may have just constituted the last straw: people took to the streets, in Bucharest and other cities, in the hundreds and thousands, starting from Jan. 12.

“Family doctors do not want to see a reform in healthcare, emergency system employees do not want reforms, and a large section of the public does not want reform either,” Basescu declared Jan. 13 while withdrawing the draft law, apparently failing to make the distinction between “reform” and “privatisation”. It is such statements – against the backdrop of austerity – that have made Basescu increasingly unpopular.

The executive has bypassed the parliament to decide over major laws 13 times over the past four years compared to only four times during the social-democrats’ 2000-2004 mandate.

In 2011, the government introduced legislation to outlaw public gatherings near public institutions without permission as well as legislation allowing private companies to conduct expropriations in the name of the state. This last law was meant as a direct tool to help Canadian company Gold Corporation finally win its long-term battle with locals to open a cyanide-based gold exploitation in Rosia Montana, western Romania.

The end of last year saw the emergence of small episodes of public mobilisation against these government tactics: using the headings of the Spanish indignados or of the Occupy movement, young people in major cities protested the expropriation law, often merging this theme with calls for better grassroots representation.

Apparently inconsequential, these actions now find their natural continuation in this month’s protests. But what makes the current protests particularly striking is their bringing together of young educated people with other social categories most hit by austerity measures: pensioners, working class, even the homeless.

Banners seen in the centres of major towns exhibit anti-government slogans, image associations between President Basescu and communist dictator Nicolae Ceausescu, calls for direct democracy, criticisms of corruption (a popular display is ‘We apologise for not being able to produce as much as you steal’), expressions of desperation such as ‘We are hungry’, but also more specific demands such as the halt of the Rosia Montana project, free healthcare and decent education for all, rights for the disabled.

“There is a lot of trust among people, it is easy to discuss everything with those around even though many social groups and political positions are present, from pensioners who come and spend the afternoon in the square and working class middle aged ladies, to NGO activists, punks, anarchists, hipsters and football fans,” says PhD student Mihai Lukacs who has participated in the demonstrations.

“Everyone is looking for the same thing, direct participation, direct democracy – all political representatives attempting to come to the square have been rejected by the people. The same thing happened with fascist groups such as the New Right: they were kicked out of the square by protesters.”

Protests have on a couple of evenings turned violent, most notably during the first weekend of protest (Jan. 14-15) when bank machines and shop windows were smashed, trash bins set on fire and several people were wounded by flying rocks. Different accounts claim that the violence was committed by football fans, or by provocateurs infiltrated by the government or the police, or by angry youth wanting to smash the symbols of neo-liberalism. The media has focused extensively on the violence.

Yet sociologist Mircea Kivu argues that too much attention to the violence erodes both the understanding of the protests and their strength: “Identifying the ‘violent people’ as a common enemy of the police and demonstrators creates a new theme that replaces the core message of these protests: the exasperation that brought people to the streets in the first place. The debate becomes centered on the violence, the government is able to declare its concern with it, rather than be concerned by the main calls of the protest, while demonstrators begin to stress non-violence rather than insist on their core message.”

That violence is in reality marginal is confirmed by political scientist Oana Popescu, who has been witnessing the demonstrations: “The majority of people out in the streets considered the violence as something unrelated to them, to their protests, and kept themselves away.”

For Popescu, one main lesson to be learnt from these events is how to integrate protest into regular democratic practices in Romania: “It is good these actions are taking place: they can be an opportunity to learn how to protest, how to express ourselves. I hope this will be an occasion for us to become more mature politically and that it will not end up with all of us going home and just congratulating ourselves for a great deed.”

The Czech government has defied calls from international human rights groups to stop the “degrading” practice of surgically castrating sex offenders.

Announcing a raft of new health care legislation earlier this month, Prime Minister Petr Necas said the government would not be putting an end to the controversial practice, defending castration as an efficient method of stopping recidivism among sexual offenders.

But rights groups have questioned the move and even the government’s own human rights commissioner has said the practice is a throwback to out of date thinking on criminal punishments and leaves the Czech Republic out of step with the rest of Europe.

“Other methods of treatment are given preference all over Europe. We consider it normal to castrate an offender and then it’s dealt with. But that is going back in time, like an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.

“If an offender is free, they can happily undergo castration, but it should not be part of treatment,” Monika Simunkova, the Czech Commissioner for Human Rights, told local media.

The Czech Republic is one of the few European countries which retains the practice of surgical castration for sex offenders. The process involves the removal of tissue in the testes which produces testosterone.

It is either banned or no longer practised in all European countries except Germany where it is carried out only in rare, and strictly controlled cases.

According to official figures, 85 people underwent surgical castration in the Czech Republic between 2000 and 2011.

The practice has previously drawn strong criticism from rights groups, most notably from the Council of Europe.

It has claimed that although Czech law states that written consent is needed from an offender confirming that they are undergoing the procedure voluntarily, some prisoners had given consent without being aware of what they were agreeing to or because they were afraid of receiving longer sentences if they did not.

In reports in 2009 and 2010 the Council described surgical castration as “degrading”, “medically unnecessary”, “invasive, irreversible and mutilating” and that the reluctance of the Czech authorities to replace the practice “by other forms of intervention is disappointing and disturbing.”

It called for a moratorium on surgical castrations pending their final abolition.

When contacted by IPS, Patrick Muller, a spokesman for the Council’s Committee for the Prevention of Torture, reiterated that the Council still wanted it ended, but that it was powerless to force the Czech government to do so.

Meanwhile, human rights groups in the Czech Republic have also attacked the retention of surgical castration.

Head of the Czech Helsinki Committee, Anna Sabatova, said after the government’s decision that the Czech Republic should do as the Council of Europe asks and that other, equally or even more effective, methods of treatment were available, including medicines and psychotherapy.

Czech rights groups have, like the Council of Europe, also raised concerns over the ‘voluntary’ aspect of the practice.

They say that sex offenders in secure psychiatric facilities agree to castration simply because they are desperate to be granted a full release or treatment on an outpatient basis, meaning that the consent is not ‘voluntary’ at all.

Zuzana Durajova, a lawyer with the Czech Human Rights League, told IPS: “Our concern is that it is very difficult to ensure that the person is really giving their consent voluntarily. They may agree to be castrated so that they can get out (of the psychiatric facility) and that raises the question of whether or not consent is voluntary.”

Czech authorities have defended the controversial practice, saying it is one of the best ways to reduce recidivism among offenders.

Czech sexologists who treat sex offenders have also backed the procedure.

Prof. Petr Weiss, a prominent Czech sexologist, told local media: “The chances of someone re-offending after surgical castration are about 2 percent. Castration lowers their sexual impulses to a level where they are able to control them themselves.”

He added that the people who underwent such procedures were “sadists, sexual aggressors and paedophiles” who afterwards led a “normal life only with the restriction that their sexuality was reduced. But this sexuality has brought them many more problems than enjoyment and many spend their whole lives in prison or psychiatric treatment. I do not see that reducing this sexuality is a great misfortune.”

But critics say there is a lack of reliable studies to back up claims about the effectiveness of surgical castration.

Ales Butala, a human rights lawyer who was part of the Council of Europe’s original delegation to the Czech Republic which called on the country to end the practice, has said the Council found evidence of three cases where previously castrated Czech sex offenders went on to commit violent crimes, including paedophile offences.

Others say that studies on re-offending are unreliable because they involve self-reporting by offenders.

Doctors outside the Czech Republic have also questioned the effectiveness of surgical castration.

In the U.S. and the UK, where chemical castration is practised on some offenders, some doctors say that surgical castration provides no guarantee that a person will not re-offend as their compulsion to commit offences may be driven by mental disorders or alcohol or drug problems rather than being sexual in nature.

They add that non-invasive methods, such as chemical castration combined with psychiatric therapy are as effective as surgical castration which can also cause subsequent health problems, such as osteoarthritis, anaemia and obesity.

The Czech government’s decision to retain the practice comes just months after legislation allowing for the chemical castration of paedophiles was passed by lawmakers in Romania and Russia. Similar legislation was passed in Poland in 2009.

In all three cases the laws were drafted by politicians who said they wanted to take a hard line on perceived lenient punishments for sexual offenders, and dismissed human rights concerns over castration.

Liberal-democrat MP Alin Popoviciu, who drafted the Romanian law, told Romanian media that the legislation was designed to “stop these lunatics” and that critics of the practice should “forget about human rights hypocrisy.”

But rights groups say that people cannot be stripped of universal rights because they are sexual offenders.

“Human rights apply to everyone,” the Human Rights League’s Durajova told IPS.

Protests in Hungary and Romania are the first signs of anti-systemic mobilisation in the Eastern half of the continent. While protests in both countries indicate dissatisfaction with their governments’ authoritarian turn, their origins differ, as does the European Union’s reaction to them.

Romania, EU member since 2007 and Hungary, which joined in 2004, have both been badly hit by the economic crisis.

Romanian and Hungarian protesters of various social and ideological backgrounds have poured into the streets this month, demanding fundamental changes in their political systems, and accusing the political elite of degenerating into authoritarianism while ignoring growing poverty.

Comparisons with 1989 are rife among demonstrators. Around 80 percent of Hungarians and Romanians believe their countries are headed in the wrong direction and are disappointed not just by their right-wing governing parties, but by the entire political system.

Opposition parties appear hopeless and powerless to oppose governmental authority, especially in Hungary where the conservative Fidesz party won the 2010 elections with a two-thirds majority.

Hungary’s protesters are so far peaceful and well organised: the peak of mobilization was on Jan. 2 when 70,000 people mobilised by several novel social movements gathered in Budapest to protest the government’s new conservative constitution.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban had so far ignored mobilisation at home but he has recently come under fire from EU officials who threaten financial and political sanctions against the country.

The EU is arguing that provisions in the country’s new constitution challenge the independence of the central bank, the data protection authority and the judiciary, but the government is also being criticised for curtailing media freedoms, criminalising the poor and conducting purges in the public administration.

Romania’s protests are more spontaneous and at times, violent. Thousands have protested in various cities around the country, the trigger being a government attempt to privatise the healthcare system.

The draft law was in the meantime withdrawn, but people are continuing demonstrations to protest unemployment, lowering living standards, corruption and authoritarianism.

“The protests are a sign of normality, of a society that cannot bear the harshest austerity measures in Europe,” Victoria Stoiciu, a Romanian political scientist told IPS, “but it’s more than that, people are questioning the whole system and the entire way of doing politics in Romania. It resembles the situation of Madrid’s indignados.”

In 2009, shortly after the global financial crisis, Romania accepted a 20 billion euro loan from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank and the EU Commission which would help stabilise its currency and its banking sector in exchange for government commitment to austerity measures.

Critics say the government’s commitment to austerity policies has given Romania’s ruling politicians more leeway to act as they please: “Romania has been an extremely diligent and submissive student of the EU and IMF,” says Ciprian Siulea, a founding member of CriticAtac, the main leftist discussion forum in the country.

“This is why the obvious and repeated infringement of democratic rules and values is overlooked. In a certain sense, politics came to an end and we are governed mainly by economics,” he told IPS.

Romania’s government is accused of ignoring official and unofficial mechanisms of social dialogue, approving laws without any consultation or parliamentary debates, manipulating elections and splitting opposition parties with corrupt means.

Labour has been especially hit by the authoritarian drift. Justifying it with austerity measures, the government has promoted temporary employment and facilitated the dismissal of trade union leaders.

National collective bargaining and the collective work agreement, the most important tools in fixing the minimum wage, have been abolished, while the government has created several legal hurdles over demonstrations.

The austerity package has also meant a 25 percent cut in public sector salaries. This has had an enormous negative impact on the image of conservative President Traian Basescu, the ‘big boss’ of Romanian politics.

Basescu came to power as a protector of global capital and free markets against an alleged communist oligarchy in the country, much in contrast to Orban who, while also elected under a promise to protect the population from the post-communist oligarchy, claimed this group was linked to foreign capital.

But now Hungary faces the possibility of a full-blown debt crisis and is seeking a Western loan of 20 billion euros – the same amount requested by Romania in the past – backtracking on its promise to pursue a sovereign and independent economic policy that keeps austerity measures at bay.

This is why Hungarian protesters feel the West is on their side – even if only for the sake of promoting the EU’s economic policy among member states – whereas for Romanians Basescu’s commitment to austerity means the EU will probably keep ignoring their cause.

“Contrary to what happened in Hungary, Romania was very much in line with the economic policies of the IMF and the EU,” Stoiciu told IPS.

However, Stoiciu notes that the Romanian leadership has been careful not to step on the most visible pillars of contemporary liberal democracy. “The abuses were not as flagrant as in Hungary. It is the ‘spirit’ of democracy that has been violated in Romania, not its legal framework. The government, and especially the president, was always playing at the limit of the Constitution, but never clearly against it.”

President Nursultan Nazarbayev, re-elected last April with an improbable yet typical 93 percent, presided last weekend over parliamentary elections that maintained his iron grip on his oil-rich country’s parliament, and further stifled dissent.

A rally by opposition leaders to denounce ballot-stuffing brings barely 100 supporters. Credit: Christopher Pala/IPS.

The opposition Azat National Social-Democratic Party was given 1.59 percent, not enough to gain a seat. Three other opposition parties were banned from participating at all. Turnout was said to be 70 percent.

The results were challenged Monday by local and international election monitors because of widespread reports of multiple voting and ballot-stuffing.

“The early parliamentary vote did not meet fundamental principles of democratic elections,” said Joao Soares, head of the 300-strong team of international observers from the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe. “We expected better.”

His assessment mirrored all elections in Kazakhstan that the OSCE has been monitoring since 1994: though Nazarbayev is believed to be popular enough to have won every one honestly, not one was deemed free and fair by the OSCE.

Nazarbayev, 71, who has ruled this country of 16 million five times the size of France since 1989, had portrayed the latest election as a step towards democracy because all seats in the outgoing parliament were held by the presidential party.

But political scientist Dosym Satpayev of the Risk Assessment Group says the arc of Nazarbayev’s rule went from more democracy to less democracy, not the opposite. The first post-Soviet parliaments, which dealt with economic collapse and high-speed nation-building, were “truly independent” while generally supportive of his rule, he says.

In 2001, several senior government officials left the government to form a series of opposition parties. Two of them, a former minister and a former governor, were murdered. Two others have retired from politics, including former central bank chairman Oraz Jandosov.

In an interview with IPS, Jandosov points out that as late as 2004, there were seven televised debates for parliamentary elections. This year, there was one, and the two most prominent Social Democrats, Bulat Abilov and Guljan Yergaliyeva, were struck from the candidates list – and the debate – five days before the vote.

Jandosov says the population’s general indifference to politics can be traced to the steady economic growth that the country has enjoyed since the turn of the century. “If incomes were flat, there would be a lot more angry people.”

Still, he says the growing gap between rich and poor is “very frightening.”

Anders Aslund, a Swedish economist based in Washington who tracks post-Soviet countries, says Nazarbayev deserves praise for attracting more than 130 billion dollars in foreign investment in order to tap Kazakhstan’s vast but hard to get oil reserves “while keeping the Russians out.”

But corruption and cronyism have made for “miserable corporate governance” while Kazakhstan “fares very poorly on all social indicators.”

U.N. figures show that in Kazakhstan, 29 children out of 100,000 die before turning five, compared to 10 in Bulgaria and eight Latvia, which have similar economies. Both boast life expectancies of 73 years, while Kazakhstan’s is 67.

That’s no accident, says Aslund: Kazakhstan spends 2.5 percent of its GDP on health, while Bulgaria spends 4.2 percent and Latvia 3.6 percent – “a recipe for a blow-up.”

In addition, says Satpayev, corruption is such that perhaps half of the budgeted expenditures for health and education is diverted. He says the president encourages corruption because “corrupt officials are grateful and vulnerable.”

Amangeldy Shormanbayev of the independent Republican Network of Independent Monitors notes that growing Internet use has made electoral abuses more visible. This time, a mother posted on her Facebook page a picture of her child’s grade book in which a teacher wrote in red ink: “Dear Parents: Please vote on January 15 in our school (N. 729) and vote for Nur Otan,” the presidential party.

In 2004, another teacher had told this correspondent that her principal had instructed all teachers to call the parents of their students and threaten them with expulsion if they didn’t vote for the government. Analysts say the pressure is applied to all “budgetniki,” or government employees.

This year, on the website of U.S.-funded Radio Liberty, a young woman is seen stuffing a ballot box, while other sites show “carousel” voting, in which a busload of allegedly paid people is driven from polling place to polling place.

But Shormanbayev says most people remain indifferent to politics. “People didn’t expect much good from their government in the Communist days and they still don’t,” he says. “Most feel that as long as there’s no war, they’re ok with the government, and they believe that if a new team came in, they would steal even more.”

If indignation was higher, people would volunteer to monitor elections, he says.

“There are four opposition parties, each registered with 50,000 signatures. That’s 200,000 people. If 20,000 worked as monitors for each election, you’d have two monitors per site and fraud, which depends on low turnouts, would be a lot harder.”

But opposition Social Democrats say they fielded 5,000 while Shormanbayev’s own network sends out 2,000, paid through a European Union grant.

A snapshot of the atmosphere of indifference emerged Tuesday in Almaty when visibly angry leaders of the Social Democratic party braved a snowstorm to stage a protest demonstration.

“January 15 is the day democracy died in Kazakhstan,” one shouted, while another pledged, “We’re not going to participate in these elections any more!” A third added: “They steal millions of votes so they can steal millions of dollars!”

But listening to them with rapt attention were no more than 100 supporters, slightly outnumbered by journalists and security officials. The uniformed police were nowhere to be seen.

A school in Slovakia has defended its decision to segregate Roma children from other students after a court ruled the practice breached equal rights laws.

The headmistress of the primary school in Sarisske Michalany, Maria Cvancigerova, said Roma children had been put into classes on their own to ensure they got special attention, and that they had benefitted as a result.

But critics say that other schools have had success with mixed classes including Roma children and that segregation will do nothing to help resolve problems with the education and social inclusion of Roma.

Stefan Ivanco of the Advisory for Civil and Human Rights NGO which brought the legal action against the school, told IPS: “This ruling is an important precedent in stopping the widespread and illegal practice of segregation at schools.

“Inclusive education is the only approach schools can take. Inclusive education in a diverse collective of students shows a child not just how to learn but how to be friendly, tolerant, considerate and responsible within a society which is, fundamentally, diverse.”

Of the 430 children attending the school, more than half are Roma and of the 22 classes at the school, 12 are exclusively for Roma children.

Teachers at the school claim the segregation has been a success.

Margita Dorkova, a teacher at the school who has spent 20 years teaching Roma children, told local media: “This has been shown to be the right decision. It allows us to give the children individual attention and adjust the rate at which we cover subjects to suit their abilities. Attendance rates are up, there are less children dropping out of school and they learn much more.

“Children from (Roma) settlements often can’t speak Slovak, don’t even follow basic hygiene practices, and their parents pay little attention to them. In a mixed class they would be condemned to failure.”

Most Roma children come from poor backgrounds and socially excluded communities with chronic unemployment and low education levels. In Slovakia, large numbers of Roma live in settlements which are little more than shanty towns and slums where levels of crime and violence are high.

Cvancigerova says that both Roma and non-Roma parents are against mixed classes and that having mixed classes could have an adverse effect on teaching of non-Roma children.

Directors at the school also claim that the behaviour of some Roma children would lead to teachers acting as “bodyguards” protecting children instead of educating them.

The school plans to appeal against the court’s decision.

But other schools have rejected the claims that mixed classes could negatively affect the schooling of non- Roma children, and point to their success in helping Roma children reach their full educational potential and in integrating into society.

Gertruda Schurgerova, deputy headmistress at a primary school in Medzev in Eastern Slovakia which has mixed classes, told local media that Roma children have proved to be among their best students.

She added: “For children that have known only poverty, filth and hunger and come to us dirty and ridden with lice it is a bit of a shock. But they adapt quickly and enjoy coming to school. They can see that there are other ways to live.”

Both government and opposition politicians have criticised the segregation at the school in Sarisske Michalany. But they admit that there is no easy solution to problems connected to educating Roma children from deprived backgrounds.

Some politicians have suggested the school should form smaller mixed classes where Roma children can get extra attention, but not to the detriment of the education of non-Roma children.

Others have said that the state should give whatever support is necessary to the school to help with the desegregation of classes and implementing inclusive education.

The court ruling also comes after years of campaigning by international rights organisations against discrimination of Roma children in schools across Central Europe.

Reports by Amnesty International and other groups have highlighted widespread systematic segregation at schools in Slovakia and the Czech Republic.

They also claimed that many Roma children were wrongly being put into schools for the mentally and physically handicapped. One study by the Open Society Foundation claimed Roma children in Slovakia and the Czech Republic were 28 and 27 times more likely, respectively, to be put in special schools than non- Roma pupils.

In 2007, the European Court of Human Rights found the Czech Republic guilty of racism and discrimination against the Roma because of the practice of putting Roma in special schools.

It was hoped the law would stamp out the practice and put an end to segregation at schools. But a recent report by the UK-based Equality charity, which campaigns for ethnic minority rights in Britain and Europe, showed that the situation had not changed.

Between March and September 2011, Equality spoke to Roma of Czech and Slovak nationality who had migrated with their families to the UK. The group found that 85 percent of pupils interviewed had, in their home countries, been placed in a segregated school, a special school, or predominantly Roma kindergarten.

The majority said they had experienced racist bullying and verbal abuse by non-Roma peers, as well as discriminatory treatment by teachers.

Meanwhile, all Roma parents interviewed valued the absence of discrimination and racism in the British type school system and said their children had better chances of success in later life after attending mainstream schools.

The study also showed the average attainment of Roma pupils in mainstream education in numeracy, literacy and science was average or just below average and that the more the Roma pupils were integrated within classes and schools, the fewer community cohesion problems existed both in and out of school.

Alan Anstead, chief executive of Equality, told IPS: “There is no justification for segregation and no basis for claims that it will help Roma students. It only deepens social exclusion.

“This school should have mixed classes. If there are concerns over education of Roma children in mixed classes, teachers should try to work with parents to resolve this. The state, parents, teachers and local community could come together, share experiences and try to work together on this issue.”

The massive overhaul of Hungary’s political system by the conservative Fidesz party is raising fears the country’s days as a liberal democracy may be numbered. With opposition parties powerless, it is civil society that has awakened to support a more participatory democracy.

A ceaseless and unilateral stream of legislative initiatives from the party led by Prime Minister Viktor Orban is turning the country of 10 million which joined the European Union (EU) in 2004 into an autocracy, critics say.

The pillars of Hungarian democracy have been shaken by a new constitution and some of the 359 laws Fidesz approved since it came to power with a qualified majority a year and a half ago.

The new constitution, which mentions god and the right to life, came into effect Jan. 2 amid widespread discontent in Budapest.

The constitution also establishes a permanent flat tax with regressive effects which will be very difficult to modify in the future, while new laws have challenged the independence of the judiciary, the media and financial institutions.

Moreover Hungarian minorities abroad, who mostly support Fidesz, have been given the right to vote in a move that may perpetuate the governing party’s grip on power.

A feeling of impotence has taken over opposition deputies, sidelined from all legislative initiatives. Some MPs have even claimed that parliamentary opposition is no longer useful.

In spite of the current democratic crisis, widespread disillusionment with politics dates back to the rule of socialists between 2006 and 2010, when Hungarians were not told the truth about the state of the economy and were then subjected to harsh austerity measures.

Many hoped Fidesz would provide a more prosperous alternative but instead it has only deepened cynicism towards politics. Polls estimate up to 60 percent of Hungarians are so disappointed with politics that they would rather not vote if an election took place today.

But Hungarians, especially younger ones, are looking beyond the party system to show their discontent with the prevailing political regime. Civil society movements are beginning to pop up at an impressive rate, while trade unions are promising action.

In a post-communist region not famous for the strength of its civil society, Andras Bozoki, a political analyst and former oppositionist under state socialism, notes that renewed civic activism is a reaction to “the rolling back of democratic institutions and the rule of law, something we hadn’t seen in the last 20 years.

“Hungary was a liberal democracy according to all international indexes, now it is considered a democracy but not a fully fledged one,” he tells IPS. People are uncertain and hesitant after both governing and opposition parties have disappointed them, “that’s why they are searching for alternatives in new movements.”

At no point was the new alternative more visible than on Jan. 2, when tens of thousands of citizens mobilised by civic movements gathered in front of Budapest’s Opera to protest the coming into effect of the new Constitution.

Among them was Attila Steve Kopias, one of the most visible faces of new opposition activism, with stunts that included getting arrested for dressing up as a homeless person and sleeping on a bench just to call attention to new laws criminalising homelessness.

“Any means of cooperation between the people and political power are being closed, so we have no alternative than to rise to power,” Kopias tells IPS.

“People have lived the last 20 years thinking politics is a job for politicians and we just have to vote. Now they are starting to realise that if we let politicians do whatever they want…they will do whatever they want.”

Kopias is hopeful more Hungarians will follow the trend towards mobilisation and participation: “I am absolutely sure the movement will grow. The big question is will it stop here? It is one thing we should send Orban away, but what should come after that? What kind of country do we want?

“We need precise requests, social justice, housing…but at least people have started talking about the details of politics while before they agreed with whatever their party said.”

Still, a large portion of the population views Hungary’s authoritarian drift passively, and is hostile to the same international bodies and states that criticise Orban’s governing style. Many among them voted for Orban trusting that his ‘unorthodox’ and ‘sovereign’ economic policy will protect them from further painful reforms.

In spite of months of troubling anti-democratic developments in Hungary, outspoken criticism from European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso and United States Secretary of State Hillary Clinton only came after the prime minister curtailed the independence of the Central Bank this month.

“This gives the impression they are more concerned about the Central Bank than about democracy,” Bozoki tells IPS.

Writing for the weekly HVG, Hungarian philosopher Tamas Gaspar Miklos makes a similar point: “The Hungarian people, so often disappointed, may see in the ‘democratic cause’ nothing more than a decorative icing on the increasingly harsh austerity measured pushed by Western powers worried about financial stability.

“We must not be amazed that Hungarian citizens show little enthusiasm for restoring liberal democracy if that means their own destitution,” the former dissident adds.

Fidesz’s last pieces of legislation are being examined for their compatibility with European law. Hungary may have to partially track down considering it is risking a full-blown debt crisis that only assistance from the International Monetary Fund and the EU may be able to prevent.

By - - and Vesna Peric Zimonjic
BELGRADE, Dec 30 2011 (IPS)

Serbia saw the first rehabilitation of a member of its royal family earlier this month, in a move by the supreme court described by historians as “deeply moral” and necessary – for generations who remember the Karadjordjevics as well as those who have learned about them from the history books.

The 15-page long court ruling says prince-regent Paul Karadjordjevic (1893-1976) will no longer be considered a war criminal – the conviction pronounced against him by the Communist regime that took over in 1945 at the end of World War II.

The ruling also says that rehabilitation means restoration of property to the prince’s heirs, seized by the Communists 66 years ago.

“The prince’s criminal conviction was of a political and ideological nature,” historian Branka Prpa told IPS in an interview. “His rehabilitation is a matter of reviewing historical biases. History did happen, we have the precise facts, and we have to look at them again. What we had as a ruling against him since 1945 was a selective approach to history and a falsification of facts,” she added.

Prince Paul was a member of the Karadjordjevic family that ruled what used to be the kingdom of Yugoslavia between the two world wars. He was the prince-regent after the assassination of King Alexander of Yugoslavia in 1934 in France, as Alexander’s son Peter was a minor.

History books, after the Communists took power, said that Paul’s foreign policy immediately before WWII was pro-German and “contributed to the Axis powers’ war of aggression.” The prince was accused of signing a cooperation treaty with the Axis powers – Germany, Italy and Japan – and was dubbed a “traitor to the nation”.

However, historical documents and international archives available for the past two decades revealed that it was not the prince who signed the treaty, but two top Yugoslav politicians at the time, and that the prince believed in vain that the treaty could keep Yugoslavia out of the war. Instead, the Germans overran the country and the Karadjordjevic family fled abroad.

The Communist uprising freed the nation and banned the royals from returning, labelling them as traitors. All their property was confiscated. But the Yugoslav federation fell apart in 1991 during a bloody war.

“The court ruling on rehabilitation tells us some other things we still have to learn about and deal with,” Prpa said. “The Prince was pronounced a criminal and traitor at a time of (Communist) political monopoly without proper procedure, by a hastily convened Commission…Tens of thousands of people met the same fate and it’s time to see justice done for many of them. It’s never too late, as so many families have suffered the consequences.”

For historian Predrag Markovic, the rehabilitation of Prince Paul represents an effort by modern Serbian society to overcome the ideological divisions imposed by the Communists who ruled the country from 1945 to 2000.

“It was the long imposed division that said ‘Communists were patriots’ as they were victorious in WWII, while ‘all the others were traitors’,” Markovic told IPS. According to him, the prince was a pragmatic yet naïve politician “who believed in negotiations and tried to avoid the war.”

In the opinion of both Prpa and Markovic, the first rehabilitation of any of the Karadjordjevics does not mean monarchy could be restored in Serbia, the part of the former Yugoslavia that the royal family came from.

“It’s a moral act of satisfaction for the family,” Prpa said, while for Markovic it is not yet clear “what the broader public thinks about the issue.” No in-depth survey has been conducted in Serbia about the restoration of royalty.

Over the past decade, several members of the Karadjordjevic family have returned to Serbia, following the downfall of the Communist regime of Slobodan Milosevic.

A grandson and namesake of assassinated King Alexander lives in the White Palace in Belgrade, since a special decree was issued by the first post-Milosevic government. He is involved in charitable and humanitarian activities.

The daughter of Prince Paul, Princess Elizabeth, lives in Belgrade as well. She initiated the procedure for rehabilitation of her father before the supreme court. In one of her many interviews in the Serbian media, the princess said she was glad that her father’s name “was finally cleared…That is the most important thing I ever wanted,” she said.

One of the possibilities for the princess now is to regain her property rights and claim some houses and a castle her father had in Slovenia. As for a large collection of classical and particularly modern paintings by prominent impressionists, owned by her father until 1945 and currently in the National Museum of Serbia, she said their place is “in the museum.”

So far, none of the Karadjordjevics have any political ambitions, unlike their relative in neighbouring Bulgaria, Simeon II. The heir to the Bulgarian throne created a political party upon his return to the country after the fall of Communism in 1989, and won the elections in 2001. As prime minister, he and his National Movement Simeon II (NMSII) ruled the country for four years, until 2005.

The Karadjordjevics will most likely follow in the footsteps of another relative, King Michael of Romania, who was also allowed to return to his country after the fall of Communism. He splits his time between Romania and Switzerland, and never took up the revival of monarchy as his cause.

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