Yesterday at the Institute of Regional Press, the public organization "Northwestern Center for Social and Legal Protection of Roma" presented a pilot project "Gypsies against drugs." According to the center's program manager Stefania Kulaeva, the center will engage in anti-drug propaganda among Roma throughout the North-West.
As Stefaniya Kulaeva told reporters, “Gypsies have become hostage to stereotypes: society associates them with drugs, but many have fallen into the net due to illiteracy.” To rectify the situation, Mrs. Kulaeva sent her Roma rescue project to the international Catholic organizations Caritas Franse and CCFD. Catholics allocated 11 thousand euros to the center. According to Stefania Kulaeva, the center will promote a healthy lifestyle among Roma, rehabilitate drug addicts and raise the prestige of the Roma ethnic group. In particular, with the help of leaflets on which the dangers of drugs will be written in Russian and Roma.
A Kommersant correspondent asked employees of the regional Office of the Federal Service for Drug Control (UFSKN) to comment on Ms. Kulaeva’s initiative. “I would like to clarify right away that when we talk about the participation of Roma in drug trafficking, we mean ethnic criminal groups,” said Anton Ilyin, head of the press service of the Federal Drug Control Service. According to him, such groups specialize in retail and small-scale wholesale trade in heroin and ephedrine. They are especially active in places where gypsies live - Krasnogvardeysky, Krasnoselsky and Kirovsky districts of St. Petersburg, the villages of Kornevo, Romanovka, Gorelovo, at Sablino station. In general, Kulaeva’s project was assessed positively by the State Drug Control Service.
DMITRY MARAKULIN

Newspaper "Kommersant St. Petersburg" No. 234 dated December 15, 2004, p. 3

Roma speak out against drugs