If you’re not ready to react when fascism knocks on the door of Roma, then you’re not against fascism
📢 PRESS RELEASE Victory Day over Fascism – May 9, 2025
Stevica Nikolić, Opre Roma Serbia
If you’re not ready to react when fascism knocks on the door of Roma, then you’re not against fascism
On this day, as we mark Victory Day over Fascism, we must tell the truth: fascism is not dead. It is alive in hatred, in violence, in the denial of human dignity. It is alive in Serbia, today.
In the village of Tavnik near Kraljevo, the house of a Romani family was set on fire. They were cursed because of their origin. A ten-month-old baby was struck. People were beaten. If you read this news without a location, you might think you were taken back in time to America when the KKK was burning down homes of African Americans. But this happened here, in 2025. And the state is silent. The opposition is silent. Those in power are silent. Instead of justice, there is denial.
This is not just a crime. This is a message: you are not human.
We ask a direct question: where are all those who have been saying for months that they are against all forms of violence? Where are the students, the opposition, the ruling parties, the civic platforms—and where are our own Romani “activists” who are part of these structures? Why aren’t you raising your voice now? Is this a lesser form of violence? Or not violence at all? Do you need a permit?
If you are not ready to react when fascism knocks on the doors of Roma, then you are not against fascism. Then you are part of the problem.
The way institutions respond—coldly, slowly, with suspicion—is telling. Not because they can't do better, but because they don't want to. How can we admit, as a society, that even now a group of 20 people wants to expel someone just because they belong to a different nationality? Imagine how we would all feel if this had happened to a Serbian family in the diaspora. Would the reactions be as slow and cautious as they are now? No, they certainly wouldn’t. That is fascism—when your existence is not equally valued by institutions and fellow citizens. When you're not even equal in tragedy.
The family that returned to their home despite threats, and the organized resistance, are proof that Roma will not be erased, silenced, or subdued. We have survived camps, persecutions, and silence through the centuries—and we remain standing. And we will continue to do so.
The people of our country have a proven anti-fascist spirit, and in this case, the neighbor who took in the family—just like the WWII resistance fighters—represents that same anti-fascist tradition of opposing fascist ideology and all forms of oppression.
Serbia must remember its proud anti-fascist history and clearly recognize who its true allies were in the hardest of times. There must be no space for lost souls who follow ideologies of hatred—ideologies foreign to this nation and never to be accepted. Such actions must be harshly punished—not only by law but also through a clear moral message that Serbia knows where it stands.
Roma are still true fighters against fascism because we confront it every single day.
Death to fascism, freedom to the people! Opre Roma!