FRANCE defied mounting international criticism of its crackdown on Roma and Gypsy minorities last night.
France was herding another batch of deportees on to planes for eastern Europe.
As the French opposition accused President Nicolas Sarkozy’s government of “state racism” and Romania expressed concern, Immigration Minister Eric Besson said 139 more Roma were due to be flown out.
Eight-six Gypsies were flown to Romania from Lyons and Paris yesterday. These followed 26 similar flights of Roma already this year but they were the first since Mr Sarkozy declared war against immigrant criminals and ordered 300 camps to be cleared last month.
Up to 700 more Roma are to be deported over the next two weeks.
In an attempt to calm the storm, or at least distract attention from a law-and-order offensive that has backfired, Prime Minister Francois Fillon and other key ministers were scheduled to join President Nicolas Sarkozy at Fort Bregancon, the presidential residence on the Riviera, to craft plans for the economy. The President has ordered ministers to cool their rhetoric and avoid fanning accusations of xenophobia.
Romania, home to most of France’s 15,000 recent Roma immigrants, accused Mr Sarkozy of “creating xenophobic reactions at a time of economic crisis”.
Brussels yesterday reminded Paris of the Romas’ EU citizenship. “France, like every member state, must abide by European rules on free movement and the freedom to settle in other member states,” a spokesman for Justice Commissioner Viviane Reding said.
Interior Minister Brice Hortefeux said France was within its rights to order out citizens of other EU states who breached the peace or who stayed more than three months without legal income or health cover.
“We are stigmatising nobody,” he said. Everyone understands that we are enforcing simple rules. You cannot just illegally occupy land without authorisation.”
But the President faces dissent from within his own Union for a Popular Movement.
Two MPs accused Mr Hortefeux of copying the round-up of Gypsies during Nazi occupation.
“Super Sarko” last month promised to expel French citizens of immigrant origin who committed serious crime. The government said the deported Romas had volunteered for repatriation and had been given E300 ($430) for resettlement.
Since Romanian and Bulgarian Roma are considered EU citizens, they can return any time. But they can be deported if they commit a punishable crime or are deemed a burden on society. France plans to start recording digital fingerprints of voluntary deportees next month to prevent people from seeking the financial benefit from repatriation more than once.
The Central Council of German Sinti and Roma called on the French government to abandon the expulsions, saying migrants involved are being sent back to extreme poverty and hardship.
Bulgarian politicians called the expulsions a “superficial” attempt to solve the problem and warned that the Gypsy issue was “a European problem” and not just Romanian, Bulgarian or French.
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