During the Nazi occupation of the Soviet Union, Roma people, like many other ethnic and social groups, faced brutal persecution and genocide. The National Socialists viewed Roma as "racially inferior" and sought their extermination through mass executions, forced labour and other horrific measures. Across occupied regions, including Ukraine, Belarus and Russia, thousands of Roma were rounded up, deported and killed in mass executions. Entire villages were destroyed, and Roma communities were wiped out. This Genocide, often overlooked in historical narratives, marks a tragic chapter in the history of Roma, where they were systematically targeted for their ethnicity, with little regard for their humanity.

Roma people, along with Jews and other persecuted groups, were imprisoned in various Nazi concentration camps across Europe. One of the most notorious camps where Roma were held was Salaspils, located in Latvia. The camp, initially established for prisoners of war, later became a site for detention, medical experiments and forced labour. In 1943 they began to place peasants, women and children, deported from the villages of Belarus and Pskov and Leningrad regions during punitive anti-partisan operations. The prisoners were subjected to inhumane conditions, including overcrowding, starvation, illnesses, cold, backbreaking work and brutal treatment by the guards. Concentration Camp Salaspils, along with other camps, represents a grim chapter in the history of the Porajmos — Genocide on Roma.

"The Gypsy question can only be considered solved when the majority of the asocial and useless Gypsies of mixed descent are collected in large labour camps, where effective measures are taken against their further reproduction. Only in this way can future generations of the German people be relieved of this heavy burden."

Otto Thierack, President of the German People's Court, in a letter to Hitler's private secretary Martin Bormann, October 13, 1939

"In order to remove Poles, Russians, Jews and Gypsies from German lands <…> I consider it necessary to transfer all functions of criminal procedure in relation to [these people] to Himmler.

I have come to this conclusion because I understand that the courts cannot effectively participate in the extermination of these people… <…> It makes no sense to keep them in prison for years…"

Robert Ritter, psychologist, chief ideologist of the persecution of Roma, 1939

“Once my friend and I broke a thread in a loom, and we were told that we had done the damage intentionally. They brought us to the camp, lined up boys and girls of the same age, put up a bench and beat us with whips. Then they gave a whip to a boy, my cousin, and told him to beat me. He said: “She is one of me” and refused to beat me, and he was punished for this. They gave a whip to another boy, and he beat me, I still have a scar on my leg from that beating. <…> We were in Salaspils until January 1945. Our army was already advancing, and the Germans decided to destroy us. They locked us in, rolled barrels of gasoline up to our barracks, but the bombing began, and the Germans, frightened, left. They no longer had time for us. Our older boys climbed out the window and rolled the barrels away from the barracks. Then they opened the gates, and our caretakers helped us leave. We found an unoccupied house, where we climbed in. We lived in this house for several days, sleeping huddled together. Then our troops came. They fed us, clothed us, and we lived in our camp for some time. Then we were taken to Warsaw, and then to Kyiv, to an orphanage. They took us to different hospitals, we sang and danced for the wounded. And then our relatives found us, came for us and took us home." 

Alexandra Vasilievna Belova, former Roma prisoner of the Salaspils concentration camp

“The Germans came to Ostrov in 1942. I was 13, my sister was 11. <…> …After Salaspils, whoever survived, who wasn’t shot, was sent to Poland to Tuchengen near Litzmannstadt (Lodz). There was a big camp there too. There were a lot of different people there. But we, Gypsies, asked to be placed in one barracks, so that we could be together. The Poles were good: they let us go to ask for bread and gave us clothes. And when they let us go, we go to where people live and ask for at least a piece of bread, at least a piece of soap. And we cut it into several pieces, so that we could at least wash our faces and hands, because it was already impossible… <…> And then, when we were liberated, we were in an American camp. There we made our own Gypsy ensemble, and the Americans supported us and gave us fabric for Gypsy sweaters. The Americans sent us to France to perform. It was probably already in 1946. I was already about seventeen. The war was over. We were in Versailles. They fed us well there. There were such gardens, take as much as you wanted." 

Olga Aleksandrovna Belova, former Roma prisoner of the Salaspils concentration camp

"I was 12 years old when they took me to Salaspils, and from there to Lodz. They came for us late at night, took the whole family and took us to the death camp. It was scary there, barracks half a kilometre long, three-story bunks and a lot of people. We children were fed well, but I saw other children too – they were given some kind of serum, they lost a lot of weight and died. Marshal Zhukov himself liberated us from the camp in Lodz, and I saw him personally."

Nikolai Nikolaevich Sukhovsky, former Roma prisoner of the Salaspils concentration camp

“Around ten o’clock in the evening, cars began to drive into the Gypsy camp, which was only twenty meters from our barracks. The Gypsies lived in the barracks with their entire families, with children, grandmothers, and grandfathers. We got used to them as neighbours, talked through the wire, exchanged news. The Gypsies lived in even more difficult conditions than we did. They did not receive a full meagre ration: it was stolen by the “elders” from among their own Gypsies. The emaciated children plaintively asked us through the wire for something to eat, and we fed them every day with what we could. The natural cheerfulness of the Gypsies, in spite of everything, broke through the melancholy and despondency: music and songs were often heard from there… <…> And so the Gypsies were taken away. Cars from the barracks, one after another, headed toward the crematorium. When the remaining Gypsies found out about this, the camp was filled with screams. <…> We had seen executions and hangings many times in the camp, and there was not a single case where the condemned man screamed or asked for mercy. He knew that it was useless, and he courageously accepted death in front of tens of thousands of other prisoners. The Gypsies did not ask for mercy either, but they resisted and screamed. <…> After getting up, leaving the barracks, everyone looked at the Gypsy camp with horror. Yesterday there was life there, and today there were empty barracks with open doors, scattered clothes and pools of blood. A team of prisoners, under the supervision of the SS, cleaned up the traces of the villainous massacre." 

I. P. Kovalev, former prisoner of the Birkenau camp

"It was terrifying to watch the Gypsies playing cheerful marches, to which the exhausted prisoners returned to the barracks and carried their dead or dying comrades. The spectacle of torture to music was unbearable. But I also remember how, on New Year's Eve 1939, the sounds of a violin suddenly floated from a distant barrack, as if a reminder of other, happier days, the tunes of the Hungarian steppes, the waltzes of Vienna and Budapest, the sounds of home."

From the memoirs of a Buchenwald prisoner (in 1938, by order of the deputy head of the camp, Major Rodl, a Gypsy orchestra was created in the camp)

The testimonies of Roma survivors from the Nazi concentration camps serve as a powerful reminder of the brutal reality they endured during the Porajmos (Genocide on Roma). Their stories, often marked by unimaginable loss and suffering, highlight the resilience and strength of a community targeted for its very existence. While the Roma Genocide remains a largely overlooked chapter in history, these personal accounts ensure that the memory of those who perished is not forgotten, urging us to confront the atrocities of the past and honour the Roma lives lost with dignity and remembrance.