Europe's Roma - stuck in a "vicious circle" of despair
Europe's estimated 10-12 million Roma are its largest minority and most of them live in abject poverty. They are on the margins of education, healthcare and the labour market. A report presented to MEPs by Hungarian member Magda Kósáné Kovács on Monday says they are locked in a "vicious circle" especially in Central and Eastern Europe. We spoke to the former teacher about her report on getting Roma access to the labour market and ask what steps can be taken to improve the Roma's plight.
Q. What are the measures in your report that could improve the economic situation of the Roma and their access to the labour market?
European Parliament, Citizens’ rights - 10-03-2009 - 13:14
 http://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/public/story_page/016-51268-068-03-11-902-20090309STO51242-2009-09-03-2009/default_en.htm



Sheffield: Asylum and children public meeting

Monday 16 March 2009 @ 7:00pm

A public meeting on the detention of children seeking asylum, destitution and unaccompanied asylum-seeking children.

* Quaker Meeting House, 10 St. James Street, Sheffield S1 2EW

Speakers include:

* Lisa Nandy - chair of the Refugee Childrens' Consortium

* Maria Vasquez-Aguilar - a Chilean refugee who arrived as a child in Sheffield in the 1970s

Please contact South Yorkshire Migration and Asylum Action Group by email:  dignitynotdetention@yahoo.co.uk to find out more.


Asylum seeker 'litigation industry' created around child assessments
A "litigation industry" has sprung up based on "unreliable" age assessments for young asylum seekers, the High Court was told today. A QC said the issue was of importance because "no less than 10% of children looked after (by local authorities) are unaccompanied asylum seekers." Charles Bear QC, appearing for Kent County Council, said under 18s who arrived in the country alone were classed as children and - unlike adults - entitled to housing and education and unlikely to face deportation.
By Daily Mail Reporter, 12th March 2009
 http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1161524/Asylum-seeker-litigation-industry-created-child-assessments.html



Raped and killed for being a lesbian: South Africa ignores 'corrective' attacks

• Women living in fear of brutal assaults by male gangs
• Country's 'macho politics' lead to lack of action
The partially clothed body of Eudy Simelane, former star of South Africa's acclaimed Banyana Banyana national female football squad, was found in a creek in a park in Kwa Thema, on the outskirts of Johannesburg. Simelane had been gang-raped and brutally beaten before being stabbed 25 times in the face, chest and legs. As well as being one of South Africa's best-known female footballers, Simelane was a voracious equality rights campaigner and one of the first women to live openly as a lesbian in Kwa Thema. Her brutal murder took place last April, and since then a tide of violence against lesbian women in South Africa has continued to rise. Human rights campaigners say it is characterised by what they call "corrective rape" committed by men behind the guise of trying to "cure" lesbian women of their sexual orientation.
Annie Kelly, guardian.co.uk, Thursday 12 March 2009
 http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/mar/12/eudy-simelane-corrective-rape-south-africa


End of Bulletin:

Source for this Message:
New Statesman
South Yorkshire Migration and Asylum Action Group
Daily Mail
The Guardian