Viktória Mohácsi (born April 1, 1975, in

Berettyóújfalu Berettyóújfalu is a town in Hajdú-Bihar county, in center of the Northern Great Plain region of eastern Hungary, near the border with Romania. It is strategically located, being 35 km south of Debrecen, the second largest city in Hungary, ...

) is a Hungarian politician of Romani ethnicity. Between 2004 and 2009 she was a

Member of the European Parliament A member of the European Parliament (MEP) is a person who has been Election, elected to serve as a popular representative in the European Parliament. When the European Parliament (then known as the Common Assembly of the European Coal and S ...

(MEP), one of only a small caucus of Roma MEPs. She was a member of the

Alliance of Free Democrats The Alliance of Free Democrats – Hungarian Liberal Party (, , SZDSZ ) was a liberal political party in Hungary. The SZDSZ was a member of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe Party and of Liberal International. It drew its su ...

, part of the European Liberal Democrat and Reform Party. She replaced a party colleague,

Gábor Demszky Gábor Demszky (, born 4 August 1952) is a Hungarian politician, lawyer and sociologist by qualification. Demszky was the Mayor of Budapest from 1990 to 2010. He was a founding member of the Alliance of Free Democrats (SZDSZ) between 1988 and ...

, on 1 December 2004. In the July 2009 European elections, she lost her seat. In 2008 in Rome she was granted the "Premio Minerva" for her activity in defense of human rights of Roma. On 21 October, Mohácsi, who has taken the lead in documenting violence toward the Roma in Hungary, received Human Rights First's 2010 annual award in New York. The Movement for Desegregation Foundation led by the former European Parliament Member Viktória Mohácsi, the leading domestic monitor of anti-Roma attacks and hate crimes documented 68 attacks, of which 12 lead to death between January 2008 and June 2010. In one of those attacks, in Tatarszentgyorgy, a man and his 5-year-old son were fatally shot as they fled from their burning house. The local police recorded that the man and the child had died from smoke inhalation, but under pressure from Mohácsi the case was reopened leading to the arrest of the neo-nazi perpetrators. Two police officers were disciplined internally in relation to the incident. In 2009, Mohácsi requested police protection due to death threats she had received which made reference to her ethnicity. Newspaper ''

Népszabadság ''Népszabadság'' (; ) was a major Hungarian newspaper which was formerly the official press organ of the Hungarian Socialist Workers' Party during the Hungarian People's Republic. Before its closure, ''Népszabadság'' was considered the '' d ...

'' reported in February 2012 that the former Member of European Parliament Mohácsi has asked for asylum in

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its Provinces and territories of Canada, ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, making it the world's List of coun ...

. While her request was at first refused in 2017 her appeal was not successful either in 2018, even if several organizations published the opposite. Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada suspended her Pre-Removal Risk Assessment, and granted her application on Humanitarian Grounds on April 26, 2018.

References

External links

Work in mass-media

Interview with Viktória Mohácsi and Lívia Járóka
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mohacsi, Viktoria Hungarian Romani people Romani women politicians Romani politicians 1975 births Living people Alliance of Free Democrats politicians Alliance of Free Democrats MEPs MEPs for Hungary 2004–2009 Women MEPs for Hungary Hungarian emigrants to Canada 21st-century Hungarian politicians