Madonna Booed In Romania

International News, By Christian Taylor, 31st August, 2009

Madonna was booed during a concert in Bucharest, Romania, after lecturing the 60,000 strong crowd on discrimination.

“I’ve never been to Romania before and I am happy to be here. But I found out that there is a lot of discrimination against gypsies in eastern Europe and that makes me very sad,” said Madonna at the concert last Wednesday. “Especially because we believe in acceptance, gypsies, homosexuals, people that are different. It makes me very sad. Everyone must be treated the same, don’t forget that.”

Romania has the largest number of Roma in Eastern Europe and according to a report by the EU Fundamental Rights Agency nearly half of Europe’s estimated 12 million Roma claim to have suffered from discrimination in the last twelve months, often in the areas of housing, health care and education.

Madonna’s publicist Liz Rosenberg said that there were cheers as well as jeers from the crowd, and that “Madonna has been touring with a phenomenal troupe of Roma musicians who made her aware of the discrimination toward them in several countries so she felt compelled to make a brief statement.”

The Daily Express said that Hindu and Jewish leaders in America have issued a combined statement of support for Madonna’s comments. Hindu statesman Rajan Zed and Rabbi Jonathan B. Freirich said, “Romania and Europe should apologise for the blatant show of prejudice shown towards Roma brothers and sisters when Madonna spoke against Roma discrimination during her concert in Bucharest.

“The alarming condition of Roma people is a social blight for Europe and the rest of the world as these people face social exclusion, racism, substandard education, hostility, joblessness, rampant illness, inadequate housing, lower life expectancy, unrest, living on desperate margins, language barriers, stereotypes, mistrust, rights violations, discrimination, marginalisation, appalling living conditions, prejudice, human rights abuse and racist slogans.”

“It’s like an undeclared apartheid… The Roma issue should be one of the highest priorities of the human rights agenda of Europe and (the) world.”

Pinknews.co.uk quote figures from a 2008 poll where 68% of Romanians thought homosexuality was a ‘bad choice’ and 36% thought that punitive measures should be taken against gays, from fines to jail.

Romania was one of the last European countries to decriminalise homosexuality in 1996 and in 2001 another law which banned “manifestations of homosexuality” was repealed.

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