The Roma school in Stara Ľubovna constitutes segregation and is illegal. The Supreme Court ruled on this in a landmark judgment. Both the state and the founder are liable, according to the Civil and Human Rights Counseling Center, which filed the lawsuit. The Supreme Court agreed that educating Roma children in an ethnically homogeneous school near a local disadvantaged Roma community results in discrimination against them on the basis of ethnicity, the advisory's website says. The counselling center filed a public lawsuit under the anti-discrimination law in 2015. The Bratislava III District Court dismissed the counselling centre's lawsuit in December 2016, and the Bratislava Regional Court of Appeal upheld its ruling in its entirety in April 2020. According to the court, although the school is attended exclusively by Roma children, this situation arose as a result of demographic developments and with the consent of the parents of Roma children. The Supreme Court rejected the reasoning of the lower courts and agreed with the Advisory Council that such education of Roma children constituted discrimination on the basis of their ethnicity.
Source: TASR, SME.sk
