Statelessness Working Paper Series 2016/03 history, Romani communities dispersed across the European continent, adapting themselves to the local language, religion and customs, with the consequence of losing homogeneity. 11 In the context of increasing EU integration, disappearance of borders within the Schengen area, and MS’ concessions on sovereignty, Romani activists have started demanding the recognition of a special status for the Roma. The first concrete illustration of Romani nationalism was the idea of establishing a Romani country (pre-baptised Romanestan) on an empty piece of land, following somewhat the Zionist model.12 After 1945, this idea faded away to the benefit of the new principle of Amaro Romano drom (i.e. ‘our Romani way’). This meant “our State is everywhere where there are Roma, because Romanestan is in our hearts”.13 Therefore, political awareness and the concept of a Romani Nation progressively emerged among Romani elites, based on the common roots of the Romani people, their shared historical experiences and perspectives, and the commonality of culture, language, and social standing.14 The first world Romani congress took place in London in 1971 and established an executive body, the International Romani Union (IRU), in charge of negotiating Romani issues on the international scene.15 Symbolically, the Romani flag and anthem were adopted during this first congress. 16 Efforts at standardizing the literary Romani language started, and in 1993 it was recognised by the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly as a non-territorial minority’s language, protected by the 1992 European Charter for Regional and Minority Languages. 17 A ‘Declaration of a Roma Nation’ was adopted in 2000 during Fifth Romani World Congress held in Prague,18 shaping the claim for a nonterritorial national recognition, asserting that Roma wanted to be officially and internationally recognized as a single Romani non-territorial nation.19 Since then, the creation of a specific transnational European minority status has been debated.20 The concept has some merit. Indeed, within the supranational frame of the EU, and through the creation of a Romani nationality, there is the potential to combat discrimination and improve Roma’s social integration.21 This would notably have the advantage that all the Romani people could obtain this special status and could offer new inroads to overcoming the problem of MS’ refusal to naturalize them, and therefore reduce statelessness among Roma. The first step of officially recognising stateless 11 See Ian Hancock, ‘The East European roots of Romani nationalism’, in Nationalities Papers: The Journal of Nationalism and Ethnicity, volume 19, Issue 3, 1991 12 In 1934, a Polish ‘Gypsy King’ of Romanian origins, Jozef Kwiek, asked the League of Nations for some land in Southern Africa (in current Namibia) so that the Gypsies could have their own State there. In the meantime, some similar demands were formulated in India. In 1936, ‘King’ Janusz Kwiek asked Mussolini for some land in Abyssinia (at that time occupied by Italy). These attempts were unsuccessful and interrupted by the Second World War. See Morgan Garo, Les Rroms. Une Nation en Devenir?, Ed. Syllepse, Paris, 2009, pp162-163 13 Elena Marushiakova & Vesselin Popov, ‘The Roma a Nation without a State? Historical Background and Contemporary Tendencies’, in Differenz und Integration, Segmentation und Komplimentarität, Mitteilungen des SFB 586, Hamburg, 2004, p77 14 Nicolae Gheorghe & Andrzej Mirga, ‘The Roma in the Twenty-First Century: A Policy Paper’, Project on Ethnic Relations, Princeton, New Jersey, 1997 15 See IRU website <http://internationalromaniunion.org/about-us/> accessed 1st March 2016 16 Nicolae Gheorghe & Jean-Pierre Liegeois, Roma/Gypsies: A European Minority, Minority Rights Group Report, Paperback, 1995, p26 17 See the linguist Marcel Courthiade’ proposal for orthographic unification in Marcel Courthiade, Romani fonetika thaj Lekhipa, Filǎn Than, 1984 and Marcel Courthiade, ‘Structure dialectale de la langue rromani’, in Interface, no. 31, 1998 18 Full text available at: <www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/60/132.html> accessed 1st March 2016 19 Morag Goodwin, ‘The Romani Claim to Non-Territorial Nation Status: Recognition from an International Legal Perspective’, in the Roma Rights Journal, May 2004, <www.errc.org/article/the-romani-claim-to-non-territorial-nationstatus-recognition-from-an-international-legal-perspective/1849> accessed 1st March 2016 20 Xavier Rothea, France, pays des droits des Roma? Gypsies, Bohémiens, gens du voyage, Tsiganes face aux Pouvoirs Publics depuis le 19ème siècle, Carobella (Ed.), Lyon, 2003, pp19-20 21 Anna Fischer, ‘Between Nation and State: Examining the International Romani Unions’, Bard College Paper no. 12, 2011, p105 2