Source: Agence France-Presse (AFP)
Date: 10 Apr 2005

Kosovo Roma refugees face unspeakable poverty, exposure to toxic metals
by Ismet Hajdari

ZITKOVAC, Serbia-Montenegro, April 10 (AFP) - Amid flimsy makeshift huts lacking basic sanitation and with plastic sheeting for windows, a group of children play in muddy paths in the three camps in Kosovo where some 500 Romas have been settled for almost six years in the shadow of a toxic waste dump.

Despite growing signs of illnesses among the children -- memory loss, convulsions, vomiting and walking problems -- bureaucratic infighting has kept them from being moved in the UN-administered province.

"We were told this will be our settlement only for 40 days. Now, six years after that promise we are without any fundamental support necessary to make our lives livable," Roma representative Elizabeta Bajrami said.

Agron Qosa, 40, who has been living in the Cesmin Lug camp, said his main income -- besides welfare of 35 euros (41 dollars) per month -- has come from "scavenging through garbage containers every day."

"This is not a human but life of animals. The last food assistance that we got in February had expiration date of October 2004," said Qosa.

Qosa and the others were forced to move to the outskirts of the Serb-populated northern part of the ethnically-divided town of Kosovska Mitrovica when their houses were burnt to the ground during the violent reprisal attacks against Kosovo Serbs and Romas in 1999.

Kosovo has been administered by the United Nations since June 1999, after the NATO bombing campaign on the troops of then president Slobodan Milosevic, aimed at halting Belgrade's repression on the majority ethnic Albanian population seeking independence.

The UN Ombudsman in Kosovo, Marek Nowicki, has launched an investigation into their situation as a human rights violation.

"I said earlier that my deep suspicion was that these people were being treated this way for no other reason than that they were Roma. I still think so," Nowicki told AFP.

Besides the crushing poverty which strikes even the most hardhearted, two of three camps are located near a toxic metal waste dump, left over from the Trepca mines, once among the largest in Europe, with reserves of lead, zinc and gold.

A report by the local office of the World Health Organization (WHO) said last year that "twelve Roma children were found to have exceptionally high levels of lead in their blood, while six of them possibly fall within the range described as constituting a medical emergency."

Also last year, in a letter to the UN mission chief in Kosovo Soren Jessen-Petersen, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) warned that the lead poisoning in the Roma camps "is the biggest medical tragedy in Kosovo," that demands the immediate evacuation of the camps.

Roma activist Paul Polanski said exposure to toxic metals had devastating consequences on the health of the residents, especially among the children.

"Over twenty children in the Zitkovac camp have the same symptoms: they lose memory, walk funny, often vomit and have convulsions," Polanski said.

"They need to be treated urgently because the toxins create irreparable brain damage," Polansky warned.

Habib Hajdini from the Zitkovac camp warned that nothing has been done since the first signs of poisoning, saying such a stance was "unbearable."

"But even the worst is when you see that no one is doing anything ... while we ourselves are powerless," Hajdini said.

Part of the reason why a solution has not been found may be the controversial administrative rules that exist in the UN-run province.

It appears that, despite many international and local humanitarian organizations, nobody is in charge of the Romas in Kosovo.

The UN refugee agency insists that the Roma are "internally displaced people," who are not under the UNHCR mandate.

Regional UN official Sergei Shevchenko has said local authorities should take care of moving the Roma from the camps, while the Kosovo Albanian-dominated government insists it had no access to the Serb-populated area.

"Everybody is trying to wash their hands (of the issue) and cover up. No one wants to take the responsibility," Polanski said.

Andi Dobrushi of the European Roma rights center (ERRC) told AFP they were considering possible legal action against the UN or local authorities.

"We believe they can not hide behind immunity," Dobrushi said.

Nowicki warned that the situation in the camps was "a test of sincerity of everyone from the international and local authorities to the Albanian majority."

"They have a moral obligation to help these people to go back home in South Mitrovica," Nowicki said.

ih/an/rl AFP 101519 GMT 04 05