Archive of articles - November 2001, page 4

Hospitals face ruin

Film-maker John Paskievich: "People should be aware"

A few hundred metres from the "white" part of Svinia, an eastern Slovak village, there is a "black ghetto". Half of the village's 12,000 population, the "blacks" or Roma, live there on a drained swamp in crumbling concrete blocks and huts made of sticks and mud. They drink dirty water and go to the bathroom in bushes. Naked children eat from bowls on the floor; flies cling to the faces of sleeping babies. Teenage girls nurse infants while smoking cigarettes."What I could not show in my film is the smell," said Canadian director John Paskievich, 53, born in Austria. "The smell there is horrific."Images of the impoverished "black" settlement alternate with those of well-kept "white" houses in Paskievich's 1999 film The Gypsies from Svinia. The 95-minute documentary will be one of 163 films shown during the nine-day International Film Festival Bratislava, starting November 30. It is one of two documentaries on the lives of Slovak Roma and one of two Paskievich films at the festival.

PSNS barred from elections

Tobacco tax to be hiked

Two arrested after refugees drown

PVC makers protest against new law

Reader Feedback: A job well done

Top Pick: Klub 22 weaves its Christmas magic in Petržalka

Eva Kováčová sits behind a cloth pillow the size of a loaf of bread. Eight pieces of thread hang from it, ending in finger-sized sticks. As she shuffles the sticks and thread back and forth - so quickly you can't follow her hands - a spider-web-like line of lace forms into a flower. In roughly 60 hours she will have finished a flower-motif table cloth."It's like ant work, requiring lots of patience," said Kováčová. "But any handy person can learn."Kováčová, 45, is manager of the Bratislava culture centre Klub 22, which teaches the century-old Slovak tradition of lace making. At Klub 22, Students learn to make lace Christmas ornaments, lace portraits and lace clothing designs. The club's students opened an exhibition of their work November 22.

Grey economy at 15% of GDP

Quotes of the Week

Joy Slovakia linked with illegal arms to Africa

A Slovak citizen has been identified as the ringleader of an international arms trading group that has defied a UN embargo on military shipments to Liberia over the past decade.The UN report, published by the Security Council's Committee on Liberia on October 17, says Peter Jusko was the brains behind a scheme to issue false end-user certificates for arms shipments.The fake certificates listed Guinea as the final destination of the arms. The Guinean government denied having placed the orders.

Community Corner

US Embassy exhibitionRusyn concert in Piešťany1001 Europe lecture series in BratislavaAustrian Embassy music festival and exhibition

EU fraud unit satisfied with measures taken

US Steel Košice rejects dumping accusations

New threat to SPP sale

Slovaks reject Czech visas

New EU funding scandal in wings?

Brussels gets cabinet Eurofund explanation

Budget passage to be a bumpy ride