Berlin / Germany (RNC Correspondent) 15.06.1997

The civil liberation movement of the Roma sustained a terrible loss recently. Katrin Reemtsma a staunch supporter of the Roma people was found stabbed by the police in her apartment in Berlin on the 10th of June this year. The police arrested her husband a t once. Car dealer Asmet S. ( 40 ), who had come some years ago to Germany from Yugoslavia. He was seized without resistance but has not confessed up to now. The couple’s 2 children, a five year old daughter and three year old son, were taken to Asmet’s fa mily.

It is not know what will happen with them later. Possibly they will go to the Reemtsma family to Hamburg. Katrin Reemtsma was born on 30th of August 1958 in Lüneburg and is a distant relative of the wealthy amateur historical Jan Phillp Reemtsma. She was s pecialist for Roma & Sinti at the society for persecuted peoples.

The freelance ethnologist ( a modern term for racial scientist ) wrote the remarkable book ’’ Roma & Sinti in Rumania ’’. For the Fritz Bauer Institute she also published the research ’’ Gypsies in ethnographical literature ’’. Her doctor thesis ’’ Sinti & Roma, history, culture, present time’’ was published in the C.H. Beck publishing house, Munich.

In this publication she tackled the history of the ’’ Gypsy ’’ -persecution and criticised forcibly the prevailing attitude especially within the police force of presumed Gypsy guilt. Katrin Reemtsma, who studied in Hamburg, Göttingen and Berkley ( USA ) w as staunch supporter of the Roma. She will be missed by all of us and we will always remember her in respect and thankfulness.