That community is called Shutka, located near the border of Kosovo. It has more than 25,000 residents, its own Roma mayor, TV and radio stations.

So, name this former Yugoslav republic on the Balkan peninsula.

The answer is Macedonia.

In most Roma communities, people live in poverty and have little political power but in Macedonia, Roma participate in a range of public institutions.

And they own and operate one of the only private Roma-language television stations in Europe. Matthew Brunwasser visited the lively neighborhood of Shutka and sent us this report:

When people think of Roma communities, they usually think of scenes like this one: a wedding procession passing through Shutka’s dirty streets.

The small shabby buildings have a rough, do-it-yourself feel. But it makes the place much more homey than many East European neighborhoods, with their endless rows of identical apartment blocks. Another special quality of Shutka is the Roma’s love of music. It is an ethnic stereotype but its also a major component of Roma culture.

One of Shutka’s most famous daughters is Esma Redzhepova. Known around the world as the Queen of Gypsy music. She’s famous for her voice and her lifelong dedication to music and humanitarian causes. She says that Shutka is special because Roma are treated better in Macedonia than elsewhere. Unlike other countries, Macedonia doesn’t force Roma to accept the majority culture and language.

“We are not assimilated and this is a very beautiful thing,”Redzhepova said. “Macedonia has done us a great favor by not assimilating us. They let us speak Romani normally, everywhere, wherever you want. You can study in Romani. Nobody gets in your way and tells you what to do. I don’t think there is any other country which is more democratic. Look, we have two Romani TV stations, we report our own news, we have a daily newspaper, and they do whatever they want.”

At Shutel television, it’s a quiet news day. News director Ramush Muarem is reading the news headlines in Romani language. Shutel is one of the few private Roma-owned and operated Romani language television channels in Europe. It broadcasts on national cable systems – and the Internet – and produces news and feature programs. While almost all Roma here speak Macedonian, director Muarem says its important for Shutel to broadcast in Romani language.

“We are the protagonists,” said Muarem. “The television itself aims to promote within the Roma people their own culture, ethnic identity, traditions, moral values and their own self-worth.”

A staff member reads “dedications” sent by family members to a relative to congratulate them on getting married. The camera films a photograph of the wedding couple taped to the wall. Its a pretty low-tech operation.

Muarem edits the newscast, including his own, as well as managing reporters, the production team and updating the website.

Muarem says Roma in Shutka and Macedonia are more politically organized than in other countries so they have managed to do many things on their own. In addition to TV stations, many Roma are in high positions, including deputies in parliament and a government minister.

Shutka might well be better off than most Roma communities, but it’s still very poor and undeveloped. In one of Shutka’s many simple cafes, Deputy Mayor Adnan Memed tells me that Roma communities lag far behind others in terms of education, income and infrastructure. And there’s still a long way to go.

“We can’t just wait for the state to help us, here in the Balkans or anywhere else in Europe,” says Memed. “Roma are too dependent on the government, in terms of social welfare or humanitarian activities. We have to enter more deeply into more public institutions in order to manage and finance our own development.”

As an example of Roma exclusion, he mentions the Macedonian government’s current nationalist statue-building craze, raising public monuments to a cast of heroes from Alexander the Great to 19th Century Balkan rebels. Memed says the Shutka authorities had to come up with their own plan, to honor the brothers Ramzi and Hamid, Roma who died fighting with the Partisans in World War II.

“We are going to make a bust where the brothers Razmi and Hamid will be,” said Memed. “Now this might not sound good, but we are waiting for the first Roma MP in the Macedonian parliament, Mr. Abdi Faik to die, and then we are going to place a bust of him here too. We dont have have that many people about whom we can say: ‘hey everyone, here is one of our people, let’s make a bust of him.’”

Macedonia recently took over the rotating leadership of the Roma Decade of Inclusion, a commitment by 12 European governments to improve Roma living conditions and social status. Roma hope Macedonia’s policy will provide an example to europe to give Roma more say in running their own affairs.

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This text below is a phonetic transcript of a radio story broadcast by PRI’s THE WORLD. It has been created on deadline by a contractor for PRI. The transcript is included here to facilitate internet searches for audio content. Please report any transcribing errors to theworld@pri.org. This transcript may not be in its final form, and it may be updated. Please be aware that the authoritative record of material distributed by PRI’s THE WORLD is the program audio.

MARCO WERMAN: In France, the crackdown against gypsy – or Roma – people continues.  Police have been raiding Roma camps and deporting hundreds of people.  Human rights groups and some European officials question the legality of the crackdown.  But the government of President Nicolas Sarkozy isn’t backing down.  The World’s Gerry Hadden reports from St. Denis, just north of Paris.

GERRY HADDEN: In the shadow of France’s national soccer stadium, some 40 Roma families erect shelters with scrap would and tar paper in a vacant lot.  They’re in a hurry.  There are children here and soon it will be cold.  For ten years, says a Roma man named Ion Zaharia, he and hundreds of other Roma lived in a vast makeshift slum under a nearby bridge.  Then this July the police moved in.

ION ZAHARIA: [SPEAKING ROMA]

HADDEN: He says the cops came early one morning, forcing us from our homes, even pushing old ladies into the street with their batons.  Zaharia says he and several families hid in nearby woods for several days, until local politicians offered them this small urban lot as a temporary solution.  The raid in question predates President Sarkozy’s crackdown.  Zaharia says the Roma here fear the police will return.

Over the last several weeks the Sarkozy government has closed some one hundred Roma camps, and deported nearly a thousand Roma to Romania and Bulgaria, their countries of origin.  The government offers two rationale:  One, that many Roma haven’t found jobs; and two, that they constitute a threat to public security.  French Interior Minister Brice Hortefeux announced this week that petty crime around Paris is way up.  That includes panhandling, and he largely blames the Roma.

BRICE HORTEFEUX: [Speaking French]

TRANSLATOR: We are no longer able to turn a blind eye on the reality that any French citizen can identify.  When he or she sees men, women and children begging in horrendous conditions – you know what I’m talking about.

HADDEN: Sarkozy’s conservative government is getting support for its Roma crackdown from far right parties across Europe.  For example, in Hungary, the far right Jobbik party is now calling for special internment camps for Roma there.  The trend, says researcher and Roma expert Lanna Hollo, is worrying.

LANNA HOLLO: It’s a dangerous populist use of stereotypes that stigmatize a group of people based on their ethnic origin.  I mean, this reminds people of pre-World War II days, where you conceived of Roma and gypsies as a problem, and as a security and a criminal problem.

HADDEN: Many Roma are choosing to come out of the shadows and fight the crackdown.  In Bordeaux recently, mostly French Roma blocked a major bridge to protest the camp raids.  And tomorrow in cities across France, Roma will march in massive numbers.  Organizers say it will be the largest collective Roma action in European history.  The Roma are buoyed in part by the European Union.  EU officials have condemned France’s Roma expulsions.  They say French police are violating a law against singling out a particular ethnic group for action.  It also says the French must investigate each Roma individually, on a case by case basis, before deciding whether to deport.

In the northern Paris suburb of Aubervilliers, local authorities are trying to provide an alternative.  They run an experimental project known as Integration Village.  It’s a cluster of neat little yellow houses about the size of shipping containers, with a community center and small outdoor square.  In 2007 Aubervilliers selected a dozen families to live here.  The idea was to get at least some Roma out of their camps, and give them a taste of mainstream life.  They get help finding jobs, help with school for their kids. And they pay only about 70 dollars a month in rent.  Roma resident Bodika Comer says he’s found work as a gardener.

BODIKA COMER: [SPEAKING FRENCH]

HADDEN: “It’s very nice here,” he says.  “My wife has also found work.  Everyone’s working.”  And virtually all of the kids are in school.  But there is one thing about Integration Village that rubs many Roma the wrong way.  The security.  No one gets in our out of this enclave without a pat-down by the ever-present guards stationed at the entrance.  After 10 p.m., it’s no visitors at all.

Back at the temporary Roma camp under construction in Saint Denis, an elderly man named Marcel Zaharia says he’d rather be in this abandoned lot and free, than under constant guard in a nicer house.

MARCEL ZAHARIA: [SPEAKING ROMA]

HADDEN: He says, “We swung by Integration Village one night because we wanted to have coffee with our brother, who lives inside.  But the guard at the door wouldn’t even let him come out to see us, not even to talk to us outside on the street.  They’re locked down under curfew.  That’s not right,” he says.  “Freedom of movement is part of Roma culture.”  Then he stands and begins to shovel rubble from one small corner of the lot.  “This is where my house will be,” he says.

For The World, I’m Gerry Hadden in Saint Denis, France.

WERMAN: You can see Gerry’s pictures of the Roma people he spoke with in his report, at theworld.org.

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