ANTI-DISCRIMINATION LOW
The Law for Prevention and Protection against Discrimination (LPPD) was adopted on 8 February 2010 and came into force in January 2011There are issues with non-compliance of this law with the EU Racial Equality Directive and the Employment Equality Directive which the ERRC already raised in its written comments concerning Macedonia’s EU accession progress that were submitted to the European Commission for consideration during its 2012 review.2The submission highlights the non-use of statistics as evidence in indirect discrimination cases, the locus standi position of non-governmental organizations limited to judicial procedures only and collective interest of certain groups, and the failure to address segregation as a special form of discrimination.
ACCESS TO EDUCATION
In the field of education of Roma in Macedonia, an ongoing problem is the overrepresentation of Romani pupils in special education. The overrepresentation occurs in either special schools or special classes for children with disabilities within mainstream schools, where children are isolated from the rest of the school population and offered a substandard curriculum that does not prepare them for educational success or employment. The special education system violates not only the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, which Macedonia ratified in December 2011, but the disproportionate number of Romani children in these schools may suggest discrimination on the basis of ethnicity in violation of a host of Macedonia’s international legal obligations.