When Italian immigrants were to be criminalized Print
Written by Sined   
Wednesday, 30 June 2010 16:12
View Comments

A bit of history: when illegal immigrants were Italians and Romania did not want them ...

The Interior Ministry in 1942 tried to stop the emigration in Bucharest where our countrymen were unpopular. In Mumbai, who had to do with prostitution was called "Italian." Documents of an age to cross the border were the poor of our country, sometimes criminal, often criminalized.

read in the original
When the Romanians were we ... And things were more or less like today, only with roles reversed. Italians went to Bucharest in search of fortune to work as carpenters, in mines or factories. They had a residence permit in his pocket, but in the end remained across the border. Stowaways precisely. How many Romanians had in Italy before joining the European Union. Unwelcome, as they are now being viewed with anger and suspicion. A half of the 900 Italians were not to consider the Romanian criminals, but the Romanian customs control to avoid being invaded by the Italians. The Italians created many problems: violent, unruly. Their story, made of rags and prejudices, has become intertwined with the Italian attempts to prevent undesirable to leave the borders and they were going to create problems to the dictatorship of General Ion Antonescu friend. Erased from the memory of a country, easy to overthrow the prejudices on others, the problems of Italian emigration in Romania come from the dust of the State Archives through the exhibition "Traces of Parma and Italian emigration between the sixteenth and the twentieth century." Over a hundred documents, many of the unpublished. These include a letter with the stamp of the Interior Ministry sent 28 August 1942 to all Questori of the Kingdom, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Government of Dalmatia, Zadar to the direction of police and High Commissioner of Ljubljana. Issued a specific order: do not allow expatriate Italians in Romania. [...]



Besides that among the emigrants there were only workers in search of 'America, but also unscrupulous adventurers is well known and documented history, in this exhibition, other letters, complaints and grievances. The oldest is a letter from the Italian consul in India who in 1893 informed the motherland as in Bombay all those who exploit prostitution were called "Italian." An association of ideas, certainly not flattering. The Italians, like all migrants, not just a security issue but also an economic resource, so that Mussolini, as evidenced by a set of circulars, forbade foreign travel skilled workers. They could only workers from simple, arms that were in danger of ending up in the meat grinder of illegal immigration. That existed then as now. The exhibition documents a series of irregular emigration occurred between 1925 and 1973: The Italians arrived in France and Corsica, but also in other countries, tourist visa and then stopped far beyond the deadline, others came in with a hand saw transit, but did not leave the country where they were just passing through. Others obtained false passports or tickets reached America via post, officially, by relatives and friends. In fact, once the other side of the ocean, waiting for that landowners had forced them to pay for grueling shifts, without pay, the cost of that journey of hope. Even this "racket", recorded material in 1908, contributes to the fresco of an era, not too far away, where the Romanians - criminalized, unwanted or exploited - it was us.

Stephanie Parmer

blog comments powered by Disqus
back to top
Last Updated on Wednesday, 30 June 2010 16:28