Commemoration in North Macedonia

Topography of the memory in North Macedonia offers no official landmarks or monuments to the Holocaust and the genocide of the Roma and Sinti during World War 2. For that reason the Roma Lawyers Association – RLA Macedonia in Republic of North Macedonia decided to focus on a virtual media campaign in the interest of the goals of the sorbotka with the Documentary and Cultural Center of the German Sinti and Roma in Heidelberg.

Commemoration was implemented over a period of time from October till December 2021 and had two components:

Component 1: Capacity building of young Roma and non Roma about the Genocide and Holocaust of Sinti and Roma during 2 World War. In a period of 2 days, a workshop was conducted to raise awareness about the Holocaust and the Genocide of Roma and Sinites during World War 2. The workshop was conducted at Mi Casa Hotel, Skopje, with 15 Roma and non-Roma participants from Skopje. The participants were selected through Shaip Yusuf Secondary School from Shuto Orizari Municipality. Methodologically, the workshop was realized in a period of 8 hours a day or 2 days of 8 hours, with 2 coffee breaks per day of 15 minutes and 1 lunch break of 1 hour. The theoretical part was presented with PPP and group discussion, where after each thematic unit, the participants worked in small groups, where each group then presented their work to all groups, i.e. participants. The workshop was composed of 6 thematic units: 1. Who were the Roma and the Sinti before World War 2? 2. What happened to the Sinti and Roma during World War II 3. How did it happen? 4. Why did it happen? 5. Remembrance and commemoration 6. What are we doing today, what can we do in the future? Each thematic unit was followed by a PPP and an attachment, which was shared with the participants. Final Narrative Report prepared by Roma Lawyers Association Macedonia 4 The workshop ended successfully, as concluded by the summarized anonymous evaluation sheets filled in by the participants at the end of the workshop. The workshop was conducted by the expert Srdjan Amet

Component 2: Increasing awareness of wider public about the Commemorational and Remembers of the victims od the 2 World War (about Sinti and Roma) After the workshop, the participants and media personalities from Macedonia took part in a virtual bath, where they were all photographed with “Anti-Gypsyism” transposed and in addition one of their sentences as a message in the direction of remembering the Holocaust and the Genocide of the Sinti and Roma during the Second Svestka War. Given that in North Macedonia, there are no monuments or markers of the victims of the Second War, RLA Macedonia conducted this campaign in the interest of gaining greater visibility and thus raising the level of awareness and awareness of the history of the Roma and Sinites during World War II. The virtual taping was conducted between November and December 2021, and published by 5 electronic media and one national media. The message got a huge visibility according to the electronic data that can be from the appropriate media.

The project is funded by the EVZ Foundation and the Federal Foreign Office as part of the program YOUNG PEOPLE remember.