localbadgirl:

September, 2017: A Romani man has been sold as a slave in Bulgaria.

The 30 year-old Romani man, Nikolay Ivanov, was sold by a co-worker to the owner of a farm (Ilian Mavrov) for 3,000 Lew – which is about 1,531 Euro or 1,799 US Dollar.

Once Ivanov realized what had happened to him he escaped and sought refuge with his former employer and informal foster family. When Mavrov – the man who bought Ivanov as a slave – heard of his escape, he went to the farm where Ivanov was being sheltered, planning to either “retrieve him or get his money back.” However when he met resistance from Ivanov’s family, Mavrov fired an electroshock weapon at the group, injuring one of them. The family defended themselves and Ivanov from further attacks, however when the police arrived at the scene Ivanov’s family was taken into police custody for causing “mild injuries” to the to-be-slave owner. The family was shortly released afterwards, however there is no report as to whether Mavrov was also taken into the custody or if he, or the co-worker who sold Ivanov to him, are going to face any charges.

A video of the fight between the armed Mavrov and Ivanov’s family surfaced online and went viral in Bulgaria, however instead showing Mavrov as the vile beast he was, it instead portrayed the Romani family as “aggressors” – sparking a significant amount of hate speech and false news coverage, as well as a protest organized by a group of Non-Romani in support of Mavrov.

Bulgaria and the rest of Europe continue to be one of the worst places to live in for Romani. Not only is the fact that an innocent family was arrested for protecting one of their family members from being taken away into slavery vile and beyond infuriating, but the fact that instead Mavrov – the man who bought another living human being as a slave and shot a man with an electroshock weapon – faced no charges and instead was viewed as the victim by the majority of Bulgarians only proves further how racism still is very much alive in Europe and that Europeans will literally twist a story as much as they please, simply to vilify an innocent family because of their Romani ethnicity. 

While this protest in support of the beast who attempted to enslave Nikolay Ivanov did not turn violent, however these “protests” have in the past often turned into lynch mobs – leaving the safety of the Romani communities in the hand of often racist police officers who sometimes even lead those anti-Romani protests themselves. This protest is actually only one of many that have happened this summer alone, where Romani communities have been collectively punished by mobs of non-Romani Bulgarians for alleged crimes.

Being Romani does not make one “guilty of everything.”
Romani aren’t your scapegoats.
Romani aren’t your property either.
Romani are equal – And after centuries of discrimination we should be finally treated as such.