This is the last article you can read this month
You can read more article this month
You can read more articles this month
Sorry your limit is up for this month
Reset on:
Please help support the Morning Star by subscribing here
Ireland's children ombudsman will investigate why two blonde children were taken from their Roma families and temporarily put into state care.
The police came under a barrage of criticism for removing blue-eyed kids from their parents in two separate incidents this week in Dublin and a town in the midlands.
They snatched the seven-year-old girl and two-year-old boy believing that they didn't look enough like their parents and may have been abducted.
They were returned to their families following DNA tests.
Justice Minister Alan Shatter has said that he had "no doubt" that authorities had acted in "good faith."
He told RTE Radio that police had been criticised in the past for not intervening enough in child protection cases.
"They're damned if they do and they're damned if they don't," he said before offering the two families help to get over the "trauma."
Mr Shatter said the ombudsman will start a probe in a fortnight after receiving reports from the police and the Health Service Executive.
He also insisted that no minority group had been singled out.
But rights group Pavee Point Traveller and Roma Centre warned that the incident was likely to fuel anti-Roma racism and suggested that racial profiling and recent international media reports may have influenced the authorities.
Pavee Point pointed out that the European Commission has berated Ireland for failing to develop and inclusive strategy towards Roma and Travellers, scoring the country just four out of 22 in a recent assessment.
"We believe that the welfare and safety of all children are paramount and this relates to all children," it said.
"Many Roma children are in an extremely vulnerable situation and living in poverty due to state policies and social welfare restrictions."
Amnesty International also called for a "full and frank" inquiry.
Amnesty Ireland director Colm O'Gorman said: "While child protection is a very serious issue, responses to reported concerns must be proportionate and non-discriminatory.
"The eyes of the world are now on Ireland and the government must show institutional discrimination will not be tolerated."
