Belgium

7 January 193464 Norwegian Roma are expelled from Belgium and leave the country for Oslo, Norway. Two days later, they board a ship in Hamburg, Germany. On arrival in Trelleborg, Sweden, they are turned away by the authorities and have to return to Hamburg by ship.

7 March 1934The German police escort a group of over 60 Norwegian Roma to the Belgian border town of Herbestahl. They are temporarily taken in there to negotiate their repatriation with Norway. Norway refuses to allow the Roma to enter the country. Most of them are deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration and extermination camp around ten years later.

10 May 1940Germany extends the war to Western Europe; the Wehrmacht invades Belgium, France, Luxembourg and the Netherlands.

16 December 1940The eleven-member Marinkovitch family is arrested in their home town of Calais (German-occupied northern France) because it is part of the ‘Forbidden Coastal Zone’ and deported to the interior of France.

10 April 1941The military administration for Belgium and Northern France prohibits Sinti and Roma from living in the Coastal Zone (East and West Flanders and the Antwerp district).

6 February 1943Nine Sinti and Roma, men between the ages of 16 and 32, are arrested in the ‘Forbidden Coastel Zone’ in Antwerp, German-occupied Belgium. They are transferred to Germany via the prison in Antwerp, the Citadel of Huy and the Saint-Gilles prison in Brussels and deported to the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration and extermination camp in November 1943. Only one of them, Joseph Collicon, survives.

23 November 1943In Tournai, German-occupied Belgium, 19 members of the Karoli family are arrested by the Feldgendarmerie.

19 May 1944In the German-occupied Netherlands, 245 Sinti and Roma and 208 Jews are deported from the transit camp Westerbork to Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration and extermination camp. In Assen, German-occupied Netherlands, twelve Sinti and Roma are loaded onto this train. Thanks to the help of a policeman, Zoni Weisz escapes deportation with his aunt and cousins. A deportation train from Mechelen (Dossin barracks), German-occupied Belgium, is coupled to the train from Westerbork en route; on this train is Stevo Karoli.