The Hungarian government has compensated a Romani woman for forced sterilization. Slovakia, however, denies that there is a similar problem in the country.

"We perceive the steps taken by the Hungarian government as very positive. However, forced sterilizations have never been proved in Slovakia," the Government Plenipotentiary for Roma communities, Anina Botosova, reacted to the compensation of a Roma woman in Hungary.

Slovak government and the prosecutor’s offices deny forced sterilizations in Slovakia. "The Ministry of Justice does not have records on or knowledge of such cases, or a court decision," said the spokesperson of the Ministry. The Ministry of Health shares this opinion.

"Sterilizations were always voluntary and practiced in cases when life was in danger and women undergoing sterilizations were informed about consequences," says Milan Filicko of the Regional Prosecutor’s Office in Kosice.

International organizations, as well as Slovak NGOs, have been claiming just the opposite for years. In his report for 2005, the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights stated that Slovak Romani women had also been sterilized without their consent. Last year, the CEDAW Committee urged the government to take responsibility for forced sterilizations of Romani women and ensured that these women had access to adequate remedial instruments.

The only measure taken so far is a law requiring informed consent to sterilization given a certain time before it is performed. Sterilized Romani women claim that physicians asked them to sign the document just before the intervention was performed.

Center for Civil and Human Rights, an NGO based in Kosice working in the field of forced sterilization since 2002, has monitored about a hundred cases of Romani women sterilized without giving their consent. "There are certainly far more cases like that," says Vanda Durbakova, who represents Romani women in ten court proceedings. She also represents three Romani women in cases tried by the European Human Rights Court in Strasbourg.

The prosecutor’s office has dealt with several cases of sterilized Romani women, primarily from Eastern Slovakia, and has also investigated allegations of genocide in this matter. Nevertheless, courts issued decisions saying that the hospitals concerned acted in compliance with the law. "We constantly emphasize the fact that the investigation was not as thorough and effective as the international law requires," says Ms. Durbakova.

Compiled from: "Slovakia Will Not Compensate Romani Women for Forced Sterilizations", SME, 24th March 2009, http://www.sme.sk/c/4362469/romky-za-sterilizacie-neodskodnime.html