Brussels, 18/02/2011 (Agence Europe) - A group of MEPs from the S&D Group travelled to Romania on Friday 18 February for a fact-finding mission about the life of the Roma community after the brutal deportations of Roma from France in the summer of 2010, explained Hannes Swoboda (S&D, Austria) in a press release and on the same day in Paris, according to AFP, French Interior Minister Brice Hortefeux said that more than 3,700 Roma had been “forced back” to their country of origin and the 714 illegal Roma campsites open in July 2010 had all been closed. France was at the centre of a controversy in the summer of 2010 in this connection, with EU Commissioner Reding (Luxembourg) slamming the mass deportations carried out by the French government.
Hannes Swoboda said that the integration of the Roma had to be arranged in their home countries, arguing that successful integration of the Roma at home will avoid any future tragedies like the one seen in the summer of 2010. Romanian S&D MEP Rovana Plumb said that the social integration of the Roma was not yet a fact in Romania and the government had done little about this in recent years, which is what caused the exodus of Roma to Western Europe. (S.P./transl.fl)