Objetivo Denuncia

Article by Nerea Villoria on the spanish online-publication Objetivo Denuncia: "La mejor compañera de viaje es, a veces, la improvisación. El fotógrafo Florian Bachmeier da fe del giro que puede dar un trabajo a medida que se avanza sobre el terreno. Una ruta programada por el este de Europa en busca de imágenes del paisaje de fronteras tenía reservada para él una parada inesperada en Mitrovica, allá por junio de 2009. Tras haber recorrido Rumanía, Albania y Hungría llegó a Mitrovica, en Kosovo, sin conocer bien lo que se iba a encontrar." (...) Read more: http://objetivodenuncia.blogspot.com/2011/03/promesas-olvidadas-en-mitrovica.html

A forgotten promise in Madrid

On Thursday, february 10, 2011, A forgotten promise stops at the publishing house and library Traficantes de Sueños in c/Embajadores, 35 in Madrid, Spain. Some information in advance: during the Kosovo War in 1999 the Kosovo Liberation Army expelled tenthousands of Roma from their Kosovo homeland, forcing them to take refuge in Serbia or, in the case of Mitrovica, in the northern part oft he city, mainly populated with serbs. After the war, they called not return to their destroyed neighbourhood in southern Mitrovica, the Roma Mahalla, an das IDPs (Internally Displaced Persons) they were settled by the UNMIK administration on the slack sleaps of the Trepca lead mines, a highly polluted area, some called it the major environmental disaster in Europe. But the already discriminated Roma suffered from more than just the dramatic effects of social exclusion, for more than a decade they are forced to live, to birth and to bring up their children and, of course, to die, in lead-poisened air and on lead-poisened soil, drinking poisoned water. Yet, in 2011, there is no hope and still there is no one who feels responsible, nor the local administration, neither the United Nations itself. A forgotten promise is just a glimpse into the suffering and the difficulties of daily life of more than 600 people living in the camps of Osterode and Cesmin Lug in Mitrovica, Northern Kosovo.

Interventions, state building and the future of European Foreign Policy

Public debate at Haus der Musik, Seilerstätte 30, 1010 Wien on Friday, 26 November 2010, 15.00 hours. I was invited after presenting my project "A forgotten promise" to the ESI (European Stability Initiative) and I took the chance to present some questions about the perspectives and the guidelines of European exterior politics concerning the situation of Roma refugees in the camps of Cesmin Lug and Osterode in Mitrovica, Kosovo. No one of the lecturers wanted to respond anything about the status of these so called Internally displaced persons living in these lead-polluted camps. Another trying to publicise the unbearable living conditions in Cesmin Lug and Ostarode for nothing...

Fluvio Report 2010

Read the Fluvio Report 2010 (http://www.parliament.uk/deposits/depositedpapers/2010/DEP2010-0688.pdf) and some interesting reflections about this report on the homepage of Flüchtlingsrat Niedersachsen from august 2010:

"Studie zur Bleiverseuchung in Mitrovica/Kosovo

Im März 2010 wurde eine geochemische Studie des “Institute of Geography and Earth Sciences” der University of Wales zur Bleibelastung des Bodens in den Lagern Cesmin Lug und Osterode sowie in der Roma Mahalla vorgestellt. Daraus geht hervor, dass auch das Gebiet der Roma-Mahalla stark mit Blei belastet ist (wenn auch deutlich weniger als in den Camps Cesmin Lug und Osterode).

Interessant sind vor allem die Schlussfolgerungen der Autoren bezüglich der Roma Mahalla. Die Umsiedlung der Roma aus den bleiverseuchten Camps wird als sinnvolle Maßnahme angesehen, allerdings nur unter der Voraussetzung, dass dort weder Gemüse angebaut wird noch Tiere gehalten werden. Empfohlen wird, alle nicht mit Häusern, Straßen oder Gehwegen bebauten Flächen in der Mahalla (also vor allem die Gärten) mit Plastersteinen oder Betonplatten zu bedecken. Alternative wäre eine umfangreiche Sanierung des gesamten Gebietes.
Die Studie wird auch im aktuellen Lagebericht des Auswärtigen Amtes zitiert. Dort wird allerdings nur festgestellt, das die Roma-Mahalla “erheblich niedrigere Kontaminierungswerte” aufweist, als die Camps in Nord-Mitrovica. Weiter wird ausgeführt, das auch die Kontaminierungswerte in den Camps “innerhalb der Toleranzgrenzen liegen, die in westeuropäischen Staaten für industriell genutzte Gebiete gelten”.

Konkret wird festgestellt das 69-70% der Bodenproben aus der Roma Mahalla eine Bleibelastung aufweisen, die über den britischen Grenzwerten für Wohngebiete und Kleingärten liegen (Grenzwert: 450 mg/kg; Roma Mahalla: durchschnittlich 513 – 568 mg/kg). Die maximale in einzelnen Proben gemessene Bleibelastung lag bei 2500 mg/kg und damit auch deutlich über dem Grenzwert für Industriegebiete (750 mg/kg).

Auch wurde festgestellt, dass ca. 70% der Proben den Grenzwert der Belastung mit Cadmium überschritten. Die durchschnittliche Bleibelastung des Bodens (0-10cm Tiefe) in Cesmin Lug liegt bei 2349 mg/kg, in Osterode bei 2412 mg/kg. Die deutschen Grenzwerte liegen bei 400 mg/kg für Wohngebiete und bei 200 mg/kg für Kinderspielflächen."
(Source:http://www.nds-fluerat.org/4606/aktuelles/studie-zur-bleiverseuchung-in-mitrovicakosovo/)

Kosovo Independence

After the decision of the Un court in Den Haag last weeks, things in Cesmin Lug and Osterode, the two contaminated camps in Mitrovica won´t change... As a reminder an extract of the 2010 report elaborated by Human Rights Watch: "The lack of international agreement on Kosovo's status continues to impede efforts to protect the human rights of its inhabitants. Caught between disagreements among its member states, and between Belgrade and Pristina, EULEX struggled in 2009 to fully deploy throughout Kosovo and execute its task of building a functioning justice system. The Kosovo authorities again failed to demonstrate unequivocal commitment to minority rights and the rule of law."

Tag des Flüchtlings 2010 - Pro Asyl e.V. Deutschland

Pictures of "A forgotten promise" by Florian Bachmeier for Pro Asyl e.V.: Magazine "Mit Diskriminierung macht man keinen Staat", 2.50 Euro (online-order: www.proasyl.de/de/shop/tag-des-fluechtlings), may 2010, Din A4.

Aufschrei durch Bilder

Article by Alois Pribil in Kulturvision 13/2010 (p. 8, www.kulturvision.de)on my project about borders in Eastern Europe. In our interview we talked a lot about the situation of the Roma in the camps of Osterode and Cesmin Lug in Mitrovica, Kosovo...

World Water Day 2010

Photo: Florian Bachmeier

The international observance of World Water Day is an initiative that grew out of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) in 1992. Water means life and there are still places in Europe where people live without potable water. In Osterode and Cesmin Lug the Roma are suffering from diseases because of contaminated water. One of the purposes of A forgotten promise is to provide drinking water, for this reason, we need your support...

Lead Through Life - A poem written by Tomas O Carthaigh

Photo: Florian Bachmeier

Lead throug life

In camps they live in Mitrovica
As UN protected refugees
The silent victims of a war they did not start
Whose plight nobody sees.

The only ones labeled IDP
Taken from them their own name
With the ’liberation’ of Kosovo
Never for the Roma, things be the same.

The planes came and bobed their homes
Roma and Serb had to flee
Torched and totured by the Albanians
They asked how this could be?

In the northern section of Mitrovica
A refugee camp of Roma stands
Along with two others,
Built by UN on Serbian lands.

Its not repaired very well
And as they rise or go to bed
In their lungs they breath red dust
Of where theyre camped: a mine of lead!

Yes UN placed camps on slagheaps
’Only for 45 days’...
Its now three years or so of tears
And there the camp still stays.

© 2007 Tomas O Carthaigh

Roma Virtual Network: press release on the visit of human rights commissioner Thomas Hammarberg to Kosovo

Commissioner Hammarberg visits Kosovo to assess the situation of forced returnees

Strasbourg, 10.02.2010 - Several European governments are forcibly returning to Kosovo persons who have found shelter in their countries. To assess the
situation, Thomas Hammarberg, the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights, visits Kosovo from 11 to 13 February.

According to UN statistics more than 2 500 persons have been returned from European countries during 2009, mainly from Austria, Germany, Sweden and
Switzerland.

Among them are some Roma, who have ended up in the lead-contaminated camps of Cesmin Lug and Osterode in northern Mitrovica, where inhabitants have
already suffered serious illnesses. The Commissioner will visit these two camps that he already in his report of July 2009 recommended to be closed. He also urged that adequate housing be offered to all families affected, together with courses of decontamination treatment.

A press conference is due to take place on Friday 12 at 11.30 a.m. in the press conference room at the premises of the OSCE in Pristina.

Cold peace. A familiarization trip to Kosovo in June 2009

Report of a visit to the camps of Osterode and Cesmin Lug in Kosovska Mitrovica(in german)written by Eva Klippenstein for Flüchtlingsrat Niedersachsen: http://www.nds-fluerat.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/Informationsreise-in-das-Kosovo-09.pdf

Kosovo Urged To Rehouse Roma, Away From Lead Mine

(Foto: Reuters)
Article from Javno, a croatian multimedia news portal, published in June 2009, during my stay in Mitrovica. "Some 8,000 Roma whose houses were destroyed during the 1998-99 Kosovo war found temporary refuge in Cesmin Lug Camp outside Trepca mine." Read the entire article:
http://www.javno.com/en-world/kosovo-urged-to-rehouse-roma-away-from-lead-mine_267362

Parkland - extract from the book "Un-leaded blood" by Paul Polansky

(Picture by Human Rights Watch)

“My youngest child was very sick... always vomiting... took her to have a blood test... more lead than the machine could register... didn't want my kid to die like Jenita... her death destroyed her mother's soul... nobody offered to help... nobody offered to take my kid to Belgrade to get treated... when I saw my kid almost dying I got the bus from Mitrovica straight to Belgrade... doctors saw my kid was dying... took her, but wouldn't let me stay with her... I was seven months pregnant... ended up living in a city park, on the streets... when I had to give birth didn't have one dinar to go to hospital... gave birth in the park... several Serbian women gathered round me... one was a midwife... helped me a lot... when my new baby was only three days old, decided I couldn't stay anymore in the park ... didn't have any money to pay for a bus ticket back to the camp... also didn't have much milk to feed my new baby... I wasn't eating enough... only once a day... sent all my kids out to beg, to make money to buy bus tickets back to Mitrovica... was dangerous... every one of my kids was beaten up by the Serbian police... didn't want any Roma begging in Belgrade... stopped spending money on food... didn't eat anything, not even me who had to feed a three-day-old baby... knew then I had made a big mistake bringing all my children with me... finally got enough money to buy the bus tickets... filled up some bottles with water... made our way back to Zvechen... came back to our poor little shack in the camp, but that was better than living on the street... that time I spent in Belgrade was very hard... very bad for every member of my family... every day we were eating just bread from the garbage cans... every night we were hungry and tired from walking around the city all day looking for garbage cans... I'll never forget this, never in my life... never found out if the doctors in Belgrade cured my kid... they'd only let me see her just 10 minutes a day... I'd like to go there again... my new kid, born in the Belgrade park, is now sick from the lead... I'm four months pregnant... I don't want the baby I'm carrying to get it too... I'm the most worried mother in camp... no one cares about us... what should I do?”

Mirsada Nishlija, Zitkovac IDP camp