Balog: European Roma must remain on agenda

Berlin, September 28 (MTI) – The issue of European Roma must not be taken off the agenda, Human Resources Minister Zoltán Balog told an event celebrating the 70th birthday of Romani Rose, head of the Central Council of German Sinti and Roma, late on Tuesday.

Balog told Hungarian public media afterwards he had highlighted in his speech that “the crisis that Europe got into, partly as a result of migration, makes us forget some important tasks that Europe must resolve”.

“The issue of Europe’s poor, disadvantaged and Roma” should not be allowed to be taken off the agenda, he said.

Balog addressed the event after German Chancellor Angela Merkel. He said it was an honour that Rose had invited him as the only “foreign friend”.

He added that Rita Sussmuth, the former president of the Bundestag, said in her address that understanding and friendship would endure only if Germans were willing to pay more attention to the Visegrád Four and the other central and eastern European countries and understand their history.

If the Germans, western Europeans and Brussels do not understand the region’s culture and its experiences from history, then “we will not be able to make progress together”. It is a shared interest that a strong Europe made of strong member countries should develop, Balog added.

Photo: MTI

Source: MTI