00:01These officers are checking a car near the city of Novo Mesto in south-eastern Slovenia.
00:06Drago Brajdiš says he's been held up for over an hour and that he's being targeted because he's Roma.
00:13They were here, they were here.
00:16They were here, only in Novo Mesto, only for Roma and nothing else.
00:20Why did they do that? Why did they do that in Slovenia?
00:23There was one person who put their finances in their hands and said,
00:27go ahead, go ahead, go ahead. How did they do that?
00:30We are not citizens, nothing like him.
00:32Slovenia's Roma community has been at the center of public debate for the past seven weeks.
00:36The death in Novo Mesto in late October of 48-year-old Aleš Šutar,
00:40who was allegedly attacked by a Roma man, sparked nationwide protests,
00:44at which some people chanted openly racist anti-Roma slogans.
00:47Two ministers resigned following an outpouring of public anger.
00:50Within weeks, the center-left government of Prime Minister Robert Golov had passed a new security bill.
00:55Dubbed the Šutar law, the legislation expands police powers,
00:58allowing them to identify high-risk areas where they can surveil and search homes for firearms without a warrant.
01:04Here, on the outskirts of Novo Mesto, members of the Roma community say they are feeling the impact first-hand.
01:10Every day, every day, the police.
01:13There are five or six officers of the police.
01:16There is no one. There are 30 people outside.
01:20They are all masked, I don't know, tanks.
01:22There are children. Some children have some disease.
01:25When they see that, they are afraid of children.
01:27There is no one before.
01:28There is no one.
01:29There is no one.
01:30There is no one.
01:31There is no one.
01:32There is no one.
01:33There is no one.
01:34Brajdić says that it is not just the attitude of the state authorities that has changed.
01:38He also senses a growing mistrust of Roma people within Slovenian society.
01:43As if we were killed by that person, it would come everywhere, somewhere in the market.
01:48We will call them Ciguna Virigo.
01:51You are killers.
01:52Activist Haris Tahirović, himself a member of the Roma community,
01:56blames the government's new security law for stoking anti-Roma sentiment.
02:00Now, in this new law, we have already confirmed the more repressions against the Roma community.
02:07The most important thing is that they would show the people to protect the people,
02:16and to bring such laws that will be criminalists,
02:20and all those who daily deal with criminals,
02:24and these illegal activities.
02:29But I see that there is only against the Roma community.
02:34Rights groups like Amnesty International have also warned that the law could be applied in a discriminatory way
02:39to the country's Roma community, which the Council of Europe says counts between 7 and 12 thousand people.
02:44When DW contacted the government for a statement, it replied that the law protects human rights
02:49and seeks to prevent crime regardless of who the perpetrator is.
02:52But legal experts question whether it can achieve that.
02:55This law will not contribute to more truth,
02:59because it does not include targeted mechanisms
03:03or thought-based mechanisms for increasing truth.
03:07In some cases, it will not contribute to the increase the position of the Roma community,
03:13which is not sensitive.
03:17The Roma community in Slovenia lives in the dimensions that are not worthy of human rights.
03:23Many think that the government's fast-tracking of the law was a political move to avoid losing votes
03:28to the right-wing populists, who are currently leading polls for the March 2026 election.
03:33That strategy may have worked at least in part.
03:48A recent poll shows that about 60% of Slovenians have a favorable view of the government's actions.
03:53I hope that there will be better than anything else,
03:56because there will not be able to do anything else.
04:00Let's say that there will be good.
04:02This will only affect some problems and that there will not be solved the problem,
04:07but that it will also be able to start with the community,
04:11and that it will also be able to do the integration of the Roma,
04:14as well as a community.
04:16While it remains to be seen what the long-term impact of the shutay law will be,
04:20it seems unlikely that it will help bridge the growing rift
04:22between Slovenia's majority population and one of its most marginalized groups.
04:26.
04:29.
