In Hungary, a heavy-metal star singing about his desire to 'kill every
gypsy little or big' had a hit. Istvan Csurka, the vice-chairman of the 
Hungarian Democratic Forum, blamed some of the country's problems on the 
genes of gypsies. Rallies in the Bulgarian capital Sofia have meanwhile
seen banners reading 'Turn Gypsies into soap'. Gypsies have been expelled 
from Bulgarian villages, burnt out of their homes and allegedly tortured to 
death in police stations. On one occasion last year, in the town of Rakitova, 
four gypsies were shot and 15 beaten in a co-ordinated armed assault by 
police and Bulgarian residents.
  The depressing detail of how in country after country many would welcome 
the expulsion of gypsies can be found in an exhaustive report which will be 
released by Jewish Policy Research (JPR) next week. It draws comparisons with 
attitudes towards the Jews in the 1930s - which are no less true for being 
obvious.
  Superficially, the report could appear to be comforting reading for 
Westerners used to sighing that the hatreds frozen in eastern Europe by 
communism have reappeared after the fall of the Berlin Wall. But this is 
too kind to the communists, who were more than willing to persecute
gypsies, and the West. In Britain, France and Germany, gypsies face two 
forces which are profoundly hostile to their nomadic life: the push to 
a united Europe and the suburbanisation of the countryside.
  A European Union without borders should appeal to gypsies, who have 
never had much time for the frontier posts and passports of the nation 
state. But the EU, in spite of showing concern about the treatment of 
gypsies in the East, has made it clear it does not want them roaming 
around Fortress Europe.
  Germany, which has still not compensated the gypsy victims of Nazi 
sterilisation programmes, initially treated the flood of gypsy refugees 
from the violence in the post-communist states harshly. Gypsies were forced 
to live rough in Rostock where they were subsequently beaten up by
neo-fascist rioters. But Germany soon decided it did not want gypsy 
asylum-seekers on any terms. Between 40,000 and 50,000 have been deported 
since 1992. Some may have been looking for work in the rich West, but 
others must have been genuine. Yet Germany has not granted one
gypsy refugee status.
  Britain, too, classes gypsies as bogus asylum-seekers and in the 1994 
Criminal Justice Act made it virtually impossible for native gypsies to 
move around. The Act removed the obligation on councils to provide 
permanent sites for gypsies, thus forcing them on to the road. At the same
time it ruled that any gathering of six or more vehicles in a field, wood 
or on a verge was a mass trespass which could result in three months in 
prison. As the JPR points out, an extended gypsy family with two lorries, 
two caravans, one trailer and a mobile toilet is now for the first time in
modern British history breaking the criminal law when it pulls off the road.
  Meanwhile the European Court of Human Rights has upheld South 
Cambridgeshire District Council's decision to force a gypsy woman, Jane 
Buckley, out of a caravan she had parked on her own land. We are seeing, 
said Peter Mercer a British Gypsy leader, 'an attempt to destroy our
culture and everything gypsies do'.
  The use of the term gypsy is, of course, politically incorrect. They can 
be called Roma, travellers, Sinti in Germany, and Tsigane, Kalderash, 
Lovari and Vlach in eastern Europe. There are so many names, that 
one newspaper asked recently: Who are the gypsies? The grim answer is
that they are the victims of the greatest and least reported human 
rights scandal in Europe.
  The Roma/Gypsies of Europe, from JPR, 79 Wimpole Street, London W1M 7DD.
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