Norwegian funds will contribute to the memorial in Lety, the pig farm is being cleared

Prague - The so-called Norwegian funds also want to get involved in the establishment of a Roma memorial at the site of the former concentration camp in Lety near Písek. This was stated by the Norwegian ambassador to Prague, Siri Ellen Sletner, at today's conference in Prague. The future memorial will ensure that the victims of the Roma Holocaust finally have a memorial site they deserve, she said. The pig farm, which was purchased by the government last year, is currently being cleared.

Today's conference presented the activities and intentions of the new European Institute of Roma Art and Culture. The ambassador appreciated the decision of the Czech government, which after 20 years of debate purchased the pig farm built at the site of the camp in the 1970s. In addition to a memorial site, according to Sletner, the memorial should be a fundamental element for the support of Roma culture in the Czech Republic.

The contract for the purchase of the pig farm for 450 million crowns will take effect on February 15. Demolition, land remediation, and the establishment of the memorial site will cost an additional approximately 120 million crowns. Jana Horváthová, the director of the Museum of Roma Culture, stated today that the pig farm is currently being cleared, and then it will be demolished.

Jan Čech, the vice-chairman of the board of the company AGP, the operator of the pig farm, told ČTK today that the farm has not yet been handed over, and there are still animals in the building. They are expected to leave the farm by the end of February, and according to him, the building should be completely cleared in March.

This year, the museum is taking over the management of both significant memorials of the Roma Holocaust, in addition to Lety, also the memorial in Hodonín near Kunštát, which has so far been operated by the National Pedagogical Museum. Last year, the government approved the transfer from the Ministry of Education to the Ministry of Culture. The memorial in Hodonín will receive a new form; although the pedagogical museum prepared a new exhibition, it was criticized by the Government Council for Roma Minority Affairs.

The council objected to the fact that the term "Roma Holocaust" was omitted from the name of the memorial site. The new center was also meant to commemorate the internment center for Germans and a forced labor camp; the council requested that Roma history remains the "central theme." Horváthová stated today that the criticism of the exhibition was also voiced by Roma survivors. In August, the traditional commemoration will take place in Hodonín, where the area should be shown in its new form temporarily.

In Lety today, people can visit a symbolic memorial and an educational trail that focuses on the history of the camp. "The Museum (of Roma Culture) yesterday took over the so-called Little Lety - the area around the memorial of Zdeněk Hůla and with replicas of three barracks, by the end of March we are to take over the space of the currently being dismantled pig farm," the director said.

She added that the museum does not want to dictate how the future memorial site in Lety should look. "We are interested in the opinions of survivors, experts, Roma, and the public. We will open a public discussion on the museum's website, and on March 2, there will be a round table in Prague where the form of the memorial will be discussed," she said.

The Museum of Roma Culture has recently joined the critics of the leader of the SPD, Tomio Okamura, who stated in January that the camp in Lety was not fenced and that there was free movement within it. He later apologized for saying that the camp was not fenced but stated that mostly no one was guarding it and people could move freely within it. Due to Okamura's remarks, the Christian Democrats are proposing to remove him from the position of Deputy Speaker of the Chamber of Deputies.