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The Spanish Presidency of the EU, the promotion of policies for Roma and the European Roma Summit

The Spanish Presidency is demonstrating the will to promote the Roma dossier on the EU agenda by bringing focus to objectives at the political level and by endowing existing instruments with substance. They will be presented in the upcoming Second European Roma Summit, to be held in Cordoba next April.

Roma-related issues have acquired increasing political relevance in the past years, and a qualitative leap has taken place with regard to the use of Structural Funds, legislative initiatives and new mechanisms since 2007. Parliament resolutions and European Council conclusions have repeatedly insisted not merely on the need to protect the human rights of the Roma and to fight against discrimination, but also to take measures and actions, especially in the areas of education, employment, housing and health, and to overcome the barriers that persist in hindering the enjoyment of full citizenship by Roma.

The Spanish Presidency is demonstrating the will to promote the Roma dossier on the EU agenda by bringing focus to objectives at the political level and by endowing existing instruments with substance. To this end, it has announced that it will work towards, among other initiatives:

Obtaining an agreement in the European Council in June 2010 that will establish a roadmap for the Integrated Platform for Roma Inclusion, by identifying its thematic priorities, by indicating a medium-term working plan, and by defining the mechanism that will underpin the functioning of the Platform.
Reaching a consensus with the Trio on a working plan so that each EU Presidency achieves progress on a single issue (for example health, education, housing), addressed by the relevant corresponding Council.
Consolidating the European Commission’s transversal approach by securing a more active involvement of the different DG related to the fields and issues that are most relevant to Roma inclusion and development.

This working plan was presented in February to Roma organisations and to the Informal Contact Group for their comments and inputs, and will be the basis for the Second European Roma Summit to be held in Cordoba in April. Following the coming Summit, a new meeting of the Platform will take place to advance on some of the conclusions reached by the Summit.

The Summit itself is expected to raise awareness and accelerate the involvement of all stakeholders. Its symbolic value is manifest in the date chosen for the event: the International Roma Day. The plenaries will evaluate the progress made to date, the continuing limitations and the challenges ahead for policies advancing Roma rights and inclusion. Four parallel roundtables will seek to bring substance to the Common Basic Principles and the Plaftform, focusing respectively on the gender dimension of discrimination and inequality, on the use of Community instruments for a more effective implementation of policies targeting Roma needs at the local level, on ‘explicit but not exclusive targeting’ and on the involvement of civil society to achieve a rapprochement between Roma communities and the majority population. A final plenary will focus on Roma health and the social determinants of health inequality.

Newsroom

The Spanish Presidency of the EU, the promotion of policies for Roma and the European Roma Summit

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