Attachments
By Sarah Stern
When governments across Europe began welcoming millions of Ukrainians fleeing Russia’s invasion three years ago, many new arrivals were eagerly accommodated and assisted as they migrated farther into the European Union. However, not every Ukrainian was given the same warm reception. The estimated 100,000 displaced Ukrainians of the Roma ethnicity have often faced exclusion and marginalization by border guards, host communities and governments, and other displaced Ukrainians.
The adverse treatment of Ukrainian Roma is a new manifestation of the systemic and individual discrimination that has confronted the community for generations. Prejudices and distrust of Roma, Europe’s largest ethnic minority, are entrenched in communities and institutions across the continent. To be sure, many displaced ethnic Ukrainians have faced hostility and challenges of their own, though rarely has their very claim of dispossession been viewed so skeptically so often as for their Roma peers.
Roma people’s challenges securing housing, finding employment, and in other domains since their displacement from Ukraine have sometimes been the result of deep-rooted structural issues. In Ukraine, for instance, many Roma lacked paperwork proving nationality, and the community has generally had lower levels of education, literacy, and dominant-language proficiency—all of which have affected their trajectory in European host countries. Other issues can be traced to more overt discrimination, such as when non-Roma who have also been displaced have refused to share spaces or associate with Roma. In either case, the inequalities have fallen hard on displaced Roma and made a difficult displacement situation all the more complex.
This article reviews challenges for displaced Ukrainian Roma in Europe following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
Roma in Europe
Prior to the 2022 invasion, between 250,000 and 400,000 Roma (also known as Romani) were believed to live in Ukraine, primarily in the western region of Transcarpathia and the Odessa and Kharkiv oblasts. Precise data, however, are lacking. The nearly 48,000 Roma registered in the 2001 census (Ukraine’s most recent) are considered to be a vast undercount, and 30,000 Ukrainian Roma were believed not to have the documentation necessary to acquire or affirm Ukrainian citizenship as of 2020. In some cases, lack of adequate documentation predates the collapse of the Soviet Union.
The Ukrainian Roma people account for a small share of the approximately 10-12 million Romani on the European continent, of whom 6 million live in the European Union. The largest numbers are in Romania (about 1.85 million), Bulgaria (750,000), and Spain (725,000). While previously nomadic, most Roma today live sedentary lifestyles. Most research suggests the Roma people migrated from northern India to Europe beginning in the 9th century and then established communities across the continent.
European Roma have endured persecution through the centuries. Between 1939 and 1945, more than 500,000 Roma—and potentially as many as 1.5 million—were killed in the holocaust of European Roma commonly known as the Samudaripen (“mass killing” in the Romani language). More recently, Ukrainian ultranationalists led a series of deadly attacks in 2018 on Roma communities, including setting fire to tents and squirting pepper spray. Roma in various countries also faced additional restrictions during the COVID-19 pandemic, as authorities placed camps under intense lockdowns. While Roma communities across Europe are diverse, many have similar stories of marginalization and persecution.
Roma today face widespread systemic inequalities in the European Union. Many say they experience discrimination and harassment, very large numbers are in or at risk of poverty and are not formally employed, few graduate secondary school, and they tend to live much shorter lives. Many distrust government authorities and institutions because of their historic treatment.
Systemic Factors Have Driven Exclusion
Consequently, the different experience in displacement of ethnic Ukrainians and Ukrainian Roma does not always mean that host communities and officials are deliberately mistreating Roma or are otherwise without goodwill. Rather, it highlights the reality of what many Roma communities have long faced in Europe.
The Ukrainian Roma community was vulnerable prior to Russia’s invasion. Approximately 10-20 percent of Ukrainian Roma lacked official documentation proving their Ukrainian citizenship. Although Ukrainians in general are able to enter the European Union without a visa (aside from men ages 18-60), not having necessary paperwork made it difficult or impossible for some displaced Roma to exit Ukraine. Even once they left, document issues complicated their ability to benefit from the European Union’s Temporary Protection Directive, which allows Ukrainians to live across the bloc and access housing, education, and other services. Lack of verifiable Ukrainian citizenship also contributed to allegations that Roma were seeking to exploit Member States’ welfare benefits; skeptics suggested some displaced Roma had either not actually lived in Ukraine or had not been forcibly displaced and were migrating for economic reasons. Nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) have found that receiving states’ support systems perceived Ukrainian Roma as wanting to take advantage of the aid without acknowledging their Ukrainian citizenship. Further, some host-country officials asked Roma to meet criteria such as securing housing before receiving temporary protection, which was not required of non-Roma Ukrainians.
Language has posed an added obstacle for displaced Roma, both to receive temporary protection and to integrate into the host community. Many do not speak Ukrainian (or Russian) and instead speak various dialects of the Romani language. This situation is not uncommon—many Roma people across Europe speak a version of Romani influenced by the dominant national language—but it nonetheless presented challenges in securing benefits and reinforced some host communities’ suspicions that those coming from Ukraine were not actually forcibly displaced.
Systemic isolation and marginalization within Ukraine also contributed to the predicament. Ukrainian Roma have lower literacy rates than other Ukrainians, which is in part a result of entrenched segregation in Ukraine and elsewhere across Europe. (The problem is not limited to Ukraine; a 2016 survey from 11 EU countries found that as many as one-fifth of Roma ages 16 and older said they could not read and write, compared to less than 1 percent of non-Roma living nearby.) It is common for Ukrainian schools with large numbers of Roma students to be poorly funded and have limited interaction with the majority community. When Roma students study in integrated schools, they are often still isolated socially, and may sit in the back of classrooms or struggle with language and other issues.
Moreover, in Ukraine and elsewhere, Roma primarily live in segregated neighborhoods and thus are less likely to have relationships with non-Roma. When the invasion of Ukraine thrust non-Roma and Roma Ukrainians into shared transportation, accommodation, and similar circumstance, many found intermingling unsettling and unfamiliar.
Because of these issues, after displacement many Roma were unable to complete the necessary forms to apply for protection, find housing and work, or accomplish other tasks. While human-rights organizations have reported that some officials helped displaced Roma who lacked documents or turned in incomplete forms, individuals and families have tended nonetheless to be in the hands of host-country officials who may not always be willing to help.
Old Inequalities Manifest Anew
After arrival in European host countries, differences in the treatment of Roma Ukrainians have been prominent in housing, education, employment, and health care. Both ethnic Ukrainians and Roma have faced discrimination because some landlords are hesitant to rent to displaced people, expressing frustration with the burden they place on the housing market. Indeed, the Ukrainian exodus has exacerbated housing shortages and related issues across the European Union; in March and April 2022, as millions of Ukrainians entered Poland, rental costs increased by 14 percent in Warsaw and 16.5 percent in Krakow. Oftentimes, neither ethnic Ukrainians nor Roma could afford adequate housing (nor, for that matter, could many native Poles). Yet displaced Roma have reported facing the added burden of discrimination based on their ethnicity. Because most Poles felt obligated to ethnic Ukrainians, many offered them homes or rooms; displaced Roma were rarely extended the same generosity. In some cases, local families have explicitly asked about displaced Ukrainians’ ethnicities and refused to house Roma families. In an April 2022 interview with CNN, one Roma woman said, “I just wish landlords would meet with us before they reject us."
One 2022 survey conducted by the European Roma Grassroots Organisations (ERGO) of 60 employees working with displaced Roma in Poland found that discrimination often occurred in relation to housing. About 48 percent of respondents reported observing discrimination towards Roma in renting an apartment and 45 percent reported witnessing discrimination first-hand in dealings between Roma and staff working in collective accommodations. This discrimination can take many forms, such as staff working to segregate Roma from non-Roma or prioritizing long-term housing solutions for non-Roma.
To be sure, Roma families do not always face explicit expressions of hostility in their housing search. Many struggled to secure adequate housing because they generally travel as extended families with as many as several dozen people, in contrast with smaller ethnic Ukrainian households. Roma families have therefore been forced to decide between splitting up or staying together in government- or NGO-run refugee centers; many have chosen to stay in these facilities for extended periods of time. In the early months of the war, volunteers and officials across Poland, Romania, and other countries also shuttled Roma families between gymnasiums and other large venues because facilities were reluctant to house large groups for long periods, thus putting Roma families at risk.
Officials in host communities have denied suggestions that Ukrainian Roma have received less support than ethic Ukrainians, and lawmakers in the European Parliament have sought to ensure equal treatment for displaced Roma. After the invasion, the European Parliament passed a resolution calling for, among other steps, “Member States to take effective measures against segregation of intra-EU Roma migrants and Roma refugees from Ukraine and protect them against unlawful expulsions and discrimination in access to essential services.”
Individuals, however, have provided evidence of marginalization to journalists and researchers, suggesting that anti-discrimination measures may be either largely rhetorical or unable to overcome the entrenched structural barriers. For instance, although Polish Interior Minister Mariusz Kamiński said in 2022 his country “will do everything to provide safe shelter in Poland for everyone who needs it,” in practice accommodations have often first been offered to ethnic Ukrainians before Roma.
Some individuals also hold discriminatory views towards Roma, including officials in prominent service-delivery positions such as at refugee reception centers. The European Roma Rights Centre for instance has documented that Roma at some of these centers and in host communities have faced segregation, violent attacks, ethnic profiling, and discrimination—including long after their initial displacement. Human Rights Watch has reported that authorities in Chișinău, Moldova had an unspoken policy to deny housing to displaced Roma at the city’s largest reception center.
Challenges in housing and other essential services are not solely due to the actions of host-country volunteers and government staff. Displaced Roma also experience prejudice from ethnic Ukrainians, many of whom refuse to share accommodations with Roma people. In Ukraine and across Europe, Roma communities live on the margins of society, and it is not surprising that Ukrainians are uncomfortable living and travelling with Roma. As Ukrainians fled, many ethnic Ukrainians refused to share train cars with Roma, thus relegating Roma to fewer and more crowded cars or making them travel by bus or foot.
The opportunities for Ukrainian Roma to voice their experiences to a receptive audience are few and far between. Some offer interviews to journalists and use platforms such as the Foundation Towards Dialogue (Fundacja w Stronę Dialogu) to spread awareness of their vulnerabilities as a minority within a displaced population. But against the totality of need during the displacement crisis, their voices have often been overshadowed. While news cycles have been inundated with stories from the front lines and of the general human toll of the conflict, the accounts of Ukrainian minorities— including not just Roma but also Ukrainians with disabilities and others—can be overlooked.
Systemic Barriers and Longstanding Disparities
It is difficult to calculate the degree to which discrimination and structural barriers are affecting displaced Ukrainian Roma. Host-country officials tend to deny or minimize discrimination, and countries such as Poland, which continued to host nearly 1 million Ukrainians as of February, are more likely to highlight their support of displaced ethnic Ukrainians than the treatment of Ukrainian Roma. The different experience of ethnic Ukrainians and Roma in acquiring temporary protection and accessing housing and social services are often a reflection of systemic inequalities that Roma communities have long endured, as well as ingrained anti-Roma prejudices. When an official denies a Roma person entry to the European Union because they lack documentation, that is not necessarily an intentional act of racial discrimination, but the effect is the same; systemic barriers produce discriminatory outcomes. Longstanding disparities between the Roma minority and other Europeans cannot be overcome by pledges to treat all displaced Ukrainians alike.
EU countries—especially Poland and Germany—have become humanitarian leaders in welcoming an unprecedented number of Ukrainians throughout the war. Yet as Ukrainians weigh whether to return to their origin country or seek permanent residence abroad, displaced Roma have often received the weakest support. Institutionalized exclusion and the presence of anti-Roma beliefs across Europe explain why the Roma people face discrimination even in the face of anti-discrimination regulations and the work of rights activists. The disparate reception of displaced ethnic Ukrainian and Roma highlights the forces that have long excluding Roma from mainstream European society and underscores how this marginalization can have wide-ranging repercussions in times of crisis.
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