Roma Exclusion Is a Security Blind Spot at Munich, Warns Roma Foundation for Europe

Brussels, 12 February 2026 – As the Munich Security Conference debates hybrid threats and democratic resilience, the Roma Foundation for Europe warns that Europe is overlooking one of its clearest internal vulnerability indicators: the systemic political exclusion of Roma.

The Munich Security Report 2026 treats democratic disenchantment, electoral integrity, societal cohesion and hybrid exploitation of institutional distrust as security concerns. It warns that foreign actors amplify pre-existing divisions and that democratic systems become vulnerable through internal erosion.

Roma exclusion illustrates exactly the kind of vulnerability the report identifies.

Around 6 million Roma live in the EU and roughly 12 million across Europe. Yet they hold just 13 parliamentary seats out of more than 11,000.

OSCE/ODIHR election observation missions regularly document vote-buying and pressure in vulnerable communities across EU member states. European Court of Human Rights judgments have confirmed systemic discrimination and police abuse affecting Roma populations in multiple countries.

“When participation does not translate into influence and standards are selectively enforced, legitimacy erodes and manipulation becomes easier,” said Mensur Haliti, Vice President for Democracy at the Roma Foundation for Europe.

Selective enforcement enables electoral manipulation, which deepens institutional distrust, fuels anti-system narratives and creates precisely the conditions that foreign influence networks are designed to exploit.

“Where democratic standards are weakest, that is where manipulation is tested,” Haliti added. “Techniques refined in unprotected constituencies do not stay there. They spread.”

High political exclusion combined with low trust creates an environment in which anti-system narratives gain traction by default. Far-right actors across Europe have weaponised anti-Roma narratives for political mobilisation. Disinformation campaigns, including during COVID-19, have targeted already vulnerable communities. Countries experiencing democratic backsliding and populist consolidation often overlap with those where Roma exclusion remains most entrenched.

This makes Roma exclusion a leading indicator, not a marginal case. The dynamics visible here—selective enforcement, manipulation, distrust, anti-system mobilisation—are the same dynamics that undermine democratic resilience wherever they operate.

“When EU commitments are renewed but not enforced, it signals that democratic standards are conditional,” Haliti said. “That perception spreads, and disinformation thrives in that gap.”

The Munich Security Report argues that societal cohesion and institutional trust underpin strategic stability. If internal legitimacy erosion is a security risk, then the most persistent and measurable case of such erosion belongs in that assessment.

“Europe cannot strengthen its external defences while leaving internal legitimacy gaps unaddressed,” Haliti said. “Resilience cannot be selective.”