Turkey’s Concerned For its Ethnic Minorities? Erdogan Meets with Roma in Istanbul

Addressing thousands of Roma who came to İstanbul to attend a meeting organized as part of a government initiative to find solutions to problems faced by the ethnic minority, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said he sees the Roma's problems as his own, reports Turkish news source Today’s Zaman.

Erdoğan met with nearly 10,000 Roma yesterday in a meeting with a festive atmosphere, a move that came as a part of the government's democratic initiative, which is intended to expand the rights of previously disadvantaged groups and communities such as the Kurds, the Alevis and the Roma.

“As the state, we have shouldered the responsibility on this [Roma] issue. From now on, your problems are my problems. Nobody in this country can be treated as ‘half' a person.

We cannot tolerate this,” the prime minister said during the speech he delivered at the Roma meeting at İstanbul’s Abdi İpekçi Sports Hall yesterday, where he was met with slogans of “Tayyip Baba” (father Tayyip), and Turkish flags being waved as he entered the jam-packed hall.

The government launched the Roma initiative late last year. A government-sponsored workshop was held on Dec. 9, 2009 to address issues facing the Roma community.

Representatives of Turkey’s Roma community in İstanbul, Edirne, Kırşehir, Artvin, Van and several other cities, 120 people in all, attended the event. A report was drafted listing the Roma community’s demands from the government following the workshop.

According to the workshop report, there are 500,000 Roma living in Turkey, while other sources estimate as many as 2 million. Some 20,000 Turkish Roma are nomads. The most significant problems experienced by the Roma are insults and discrimination. They are generally referred to as “çingene,” a pejorative term meaning gypsy.

Stressing that Roma were treated as equal citizens during the reign of Ottoman Empire, Erdoğan said: “My brothers, I want to underline this point. Our civilization is nurtured by tolerance. The only thing not tolerated in these lands is intolerance. People from different backgrounds lived in these lands for centuries. … Our lands have never witnessed racism in history.”