Hungarian official opposes collective compensation for Roma Holocaust survivors

07 November 1997

On August 7, Hungarian media reported that the chairman of parliament's Human Rights, Minorities and Religious Affairs Committee, Mr. Gábor Gellért Kis, does not support collective compensation of Hungarian Roma who suffered during the Holocaust. According to a Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty report on August 4, the idea of collective compensation had been proposed by the National Roma Minority Council. According to Flórián Farkas, parliamentary representative of Hungary's 500,000 strong Roma minority, at least 50,000 Hungarian Roma died in concentration camps. Mr Farkas said that the community as a whole is entitled to collective compensation for crimes committed against it by the Hungarian Arrow Cross facist movement. Mr Gellért Kis, chairman of parliament's Human Rights, Minorities and Religious Affairs Committee, claimed that such compensation would be unprecedented in Hungarian legal history and that he would prefer to see the sort of case-by-case procedure which compensated other Holocaust survivors.

(RFE/RL)