Speech of Csaba Tabajdi, Member of the European Parliament, Co-chair of the

Intergroup on Traditional Minorities, National Communities and Languages

Moscow, 17 May, 2012

Dear Representatives of the Traditional National Minorities, National Communities

and Co-Nations,

Dear Minority-Friendly Members of the Majority (as myself),

Dear Friends,

About FUEN and the Congress

• Since I entered political life in 1989, I have devoted my professional carrier for

the protection of national minorities.

• In this never-ending fight, it is crucial to have a reliable, trustworthy and

professional partner.

• For me, on the front of minority protection, the Federal Union of European

National Minorities has been the partner that I could always trust and rely on.

• During its sixty-three year long history, FUEN has become the most important,

best organized and most influential organization of the European minority

protection.

• These sixty-three years have seen countless battles:

o battles for the rights and non-discrimination of national minorities, for

the survival of languages and for the existence of peoples and cultures;

o struggles for the autonomy of South Tyrol, for the peaceful

cohabitation of nations at the Western Balkans, for the survival of

regional languages in France.

o This organisation brought the issue of national minorities to the

attention of national and European politicians.

o This organisation created the common definition of the notion

'traditional minority', as we understand it today throughout Europe.

o This organisation had a decisive role in the drafting, adoption and

ratification process of the Framework Convention for the Protection

of National Minorities and the Charter for Regional or Minority

Languages.

• This is the third occasion, when I have the honour to deliver the key note speech

at the FUEN Congress. First I had this great opportunity, as state secretary

responsible for national minorities, more than twenty years ago, in the autumn of

1989, in Munich. For the second time, I delivered a key-note speech at the

historically important Congress in Bautzen, in 2006, when the Congress adopted

the FUEN's Charter for the autochthonous minorities in Europe.

• As Chair of the Intergroup on Traditional Minorities, National Communities and

Languages of the European Parliament, I am proud to be here with you, at the

FUEN Congress and I respectfully thank President Hans Heinrich Hansen

and FUEN director Jan Diedrichsen for the invitation.

About Moscow

• I am pleased that this year, we have gathered in Moscow.

• I have a strong personal bond with the city, as 37 years ago I have started my

professional carrier here, at the Hungarian Embassy. It is obvious for me that this

was the main reason behind the choice of the Congress' venue.

• If not, than there is also professional rationale: according to the Council of

Europe at least 185 national minorities are living in Russia. More than in any

other European countries.

• The diversity of Russian minorities is staggering. It ranges from the million-

strong Tatars to the small indigenous people of the North, such as the Samis. One

feature, however, connects them to one-another and to minorities living inside

the European Union: they all have to struggle for their existence, for the

preservation of their language, culture and identity.

• The protection of national minorities, however, cannot be biased towards any

nation. Minority rights have to be universally recognised, especially within the

boundaries of the European Union and in relation with the Russian-speaking

people living in the Baltic States.

/more about the situation of Finno-Ugric minorities in Russia and Russian-speaking

minorities in the Baltic states can be found in Annex 1/

The situation of minority protection in Europe

The past...

• In the 1990's we have experienced a great progress tipping in the adoption of

the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities and the

Charter for Regional or Minority Languages.

• The impetus of minority protection, however, considerably slowed down in the

past decade. Part of the reason is that the European Union, which integrated

Central and Eastern European and Baltic new member states in 2004 and

2007, does not have its own system of minority protection.

• Traditional national minorities make up 8% of the European Union's

population. Add to this the 30-35 million people belonging to new, immigrant

minorities, representing about 6,5% of the EU population.

• Every seventh people in the European Union are in minority status and thus

have double or multiple identities. This identity pluralism is, however, often

disregarded or identified as a threat by the mainstream political forces and the

majority of the society.

The present...

• The Copenhagen criteria and article 2 of the Lisbon treaty have no legally

binding nature and provide only a soft law basis.

• The EU's antidiscrimination directive fails to comprehend the specific needs of

traditional national minorities.

• The EU's Fundamental Rights Agency since its establishment performed only

one comprehensive monitoring on the situation of national minorities.

• In the lack of additional protocols on minority rights, the EU's accession to the

European Convention on Human Rights will not create the necessary hard-law

basis.

• Presently, there are no comprehensive standards for minority rights in the

European Union.

/more about the present framework of the protection of minority rights in the

European Union can be found in Annex 2/

• The EU has to overcome its present deficiency in this field. European societies

are increasingly becoming multicultural and multiethnic. National identity

remains a strong source of motivation, inspiration and pride in the world of

globalization. If the EU fails to recognize this, tensions stemming from

clashing national identities will weaken or even rip apart the community in the

21st century.

What the EU has to do?

I. Establishing a connection between the legal framework of the Council of

Europe and the EU's acquis communautaire

• The EU has to adopt the already established system of minority protection of

the Council of Europe. It seems very unlikely that the EU is able to work out its

own system and also it would be an unnecessary regulatory duplication.

o This would require the EU's accession to the Framework Convention

and the Language Charter, allowing EU citizens to claim these rights

vis-à-vis EU institutions.

o The Court of the European Union should also incorporate the case

law of the European Court of Human Rights into its decisions.

o Recently we saw the first seed of cooperation between the European

Commission and the Secretary General of the Council of Europe. As a

Hungarian patriot, I am not proud of it, but the European Commission

agreed that it will rely on the assessment of the Venice Commission

about the lately adopted new Hungarian constitution and cardinal laws.

This cooperation may serve as a precedent in our struggle to adapt the

Council of Europe's experience and expertise on minority issues.

II. Actions within the European Union to protect the rights of traditional

national minorities - What's the added value of the Intergroup?

1. Adopting a draft resolution in the European Parliament on the protection of

traditional national and ethnic minorities

• The Intergroup will initiate the adoption of a European parliamentary resolution

on the protection of traditional national and ethnic minorities. This is not a

legally binding tool, but it would be an important political point of reference in

the future. The resolution must summarize the principles, methods and best

practices of European minority rights.

• The resolution provides clear definition of the notion of traditional national

minority and distinguishes it from other minorities, such as immigrant minorities

and the Roma. It specifies individual and collective rights, the different forms

of autonomy and demands the establishment of a comprehensive and legally

binding system of protection for minority rights.

/more about the content of the European parliamentary resolution can be found in Annex 3/

2. Adopting a strategy of national frameworks of the protection of traditional

national minorities

• Recently the European Framework of National Roma Strategies has been

adopted, and member states had to file their national strategies on the

inclusion of the Roma by the end of last year. The European Commission, with

the assistance of the Fundamental Rights Agency monitors national plans and

proposes recommendations that can be adopted in the Council of the EU.

• A similar European-level regular monitoring has to be established for the

protection of traditional minorities. The regular, yearly monitoring performed

by the European Commission have to cover

o anti-discrimination policy; equal access to public services and

media; the use, teaching and preservation of the native language; and

better social- and labour-market inclusion.

• Again, this is not a legally binding tool, but politically member states would be

accountable to the European Commission and to each other. Also, the general

public and the representatives of traditional national minorities could make

pressure on the member states to adopt the national strategies.

• In November 2012 we will receive Mr Marti Ahtisaari in the European

Parliament. Mr Ahtisaari will introduce his plan on the peaceful cohabitation of

the majority and minorities on European level based on the successful model

of integration of the Swedish-speaking population in Finland.

3. Launching a citizens' initiative on the protection of traditional national

minorities

• The Intergroup also supports the proposal of Mr Gyula Winkler and the FUEN to

launch a citizens' initiative on the protection of traditional national minorities.

o The citizens' initiative has to call on the European Commission to adopt a

legal tool, which in our case have to be a directive. As we all know, the

protection of minority rights has no direct legal ground in the EU's

legislation. This complicates the drafting of the question.

o Prior expert consultations suggest that the protection of national minorities

per se cannot be the subject of the initiative. The legal tool must

concentrate on individual rights related to anti-discrimination policy,

cultural, educational, language and religious rights, freedom of

expression and freedom of association.

• The three initiatives, namely the European parliamentary resolution, the

European framework of national minority protection strategies and the

citizens' initiative are not competing, but complementing each other.

• We need each of them and the Intergroup aims to advance all the three

initiatives. Beyond these activities, the Intergroup remains the most

important forum of the protection of traditional national minorities in the

European Parliament.

• We are open to discuss any subjects related to the subject, let it be a negative or a

positive example. We keep the issues of national minorities on the agenda of

the European Parliament and help European decision makers to get acquainted

with this problem.

Conclusions

• If the European Union wishes to maintain the internal peace, stability and

balance of its increasingly multiethnic and multicultural societies, it must

guarantee the rights of people belonging to minorities.

• A conceptual shift is needed, primarily in the Western part of Europe. It has to

be reckoned that the rule of law, citizenship, pluralist democracy and the social

state cannot settle and resolve issues of national identity.

• Distinction has to be made between national identity and ethnicity. Multiple

identities have to be recognized.

• Diversity should be regarded as an asset and not as a threat to nations.

• A spectre haunts Europe: the legitimate fight of the traditional national

minorities and co-nations!

• Minorities of Europe Unite!

Annex I The situation of Finno Ugric minorities in Russia and the Russian minorities within the EU • Of the many indigenous minorities living in Russia, the Intergroup on

Traditional Minorities in the European Parliament dealt specifically with the situation of the Mari people, a 600.000-strong Finno-Ugric nation.

• They face considerable difficulties in the field of education, political representation, access to the media and were threatened by regular physical harassment. On the initiative of Intergroup members, the European Parliament adopted two resolutions on the situation in the Mari El Republic and the attack on Galina Kozlova, in 2005 and 2007 respectively.

• The rights of Finno-Ugric minorities in Russia have also been discussed many times in the Finno-Ugric Forum of the European Parliament, set up on my initiative in 2004.

• The protection of national minorities, however, cannot be biased towards any nation. Minority rights have to be universally recognised, especially within the boundaries of the European Union.

• In the spirit of this principle the Intergroup also stepped up for the rights of Russian-speaking people living in the Baltic States. We dealt with their situation in Estonia, following the inter-ethnic clashes in April 2007, in Tallinn. We also raised our voice on several occasions for the citizenship and inclusion of the Russian speaking minority in Latvia. The Intergroup supported the Russian minority's referendum on the inclusion of Russian as a state language in February, this year. The initiative was regrettably unsuccessful, but raised the awareness of Europeans to the problem.

• When dealing with Russian speaking minorities in the Baltic States emphasize the unique nature of this minority group. Besides the three long-established categories, traditional, new-immigrant and Roma minorities, the Russian-speakers in the Baltic States constitute a fourth, mixed or hybrid category. Part of them is indigenous, living together with the majority for hundreds of years, but part of them arrived in the last fifty years and therefore can be regarded as a new, immigrant minority (semi-traditional / semi-migrant, hybrid national community). The two parts are, however, unified by the often-felt discrimination of the country where they are living.

Annex 2 The present framework of the protection of minority rights in the European Union • The Copenhagen criteria provide a soft law basis, but its inconsistent

application led to double standards. It can be endorsed as political requirement vis-avis candidate countries. But since it has no legally binding

nature, the European Union cannot demand its application from the member states after the accession. After the accession the supervision of the European institutions ended. This led to stagnation, even in some cases deterioration of the minorities' status.

• Article 2 of the Lisbon treaty defends the rights of persons belonging to minorities. However, it is certain that this half-sentence is inadequate to build a comprehensive system of minority protection on it.

• The EU's antidiscrimination directive provides basic protection against discrimination, but fails to comprehend the specific needs of traditional national minorities.

• The EU's Fundamental Rights Agency, established in 2006 and reinforced by the Lisbon treaty in 2009, performed a comprehensive monitoring on the situation of national minorities in EU member states. The study published in 2011, however, came to the conclusion that in the lack of a proper system of minority protection, the EU cannot effectively step up for minority rights. From the EU's viewpoint, it remains mainly the member states' discretion to guarantee the rights of traditional minorities and EU institutions cannot enforce these obligations.

• The EU is currently joining to the European Convention on Human Rights (French and UK ratification is pending). But in the lack of additional protocols on minority rights, or on cultural rights added to the convention, there is no possibility for minorities to turn to the European Court of Human Rights in case of breaches of minority rights.

• There is no rule, whatsoever, on the obligatory representation of minorities on European elections. The present European Parliament has a much lower number of minority representatives then the previous had.

The EU has to overcome its present deficiency in this field. European societies are increasingly becoming multicultural and multiethnic. National identity remains a strong source of motivation, inspiration and pride in the world of globalization. If the EU fails to recognize this, tensions stemming from clashing national identities will weaken or even rip apart the community in the 21st century. Annex 3 Content of the European parliamentary resolution • We are currently discussing and drafting a European parliamentary resolution

on the protection of traditional national and ethnic minorities within the framework of the European Union. A similar resolution has been drafted in the last term of the European Parliament, but then it did not get the support of the main political groups.

o The resolution provides clear definition of the notion of traditional national minority and distinguishes it from other minorities, such as immigrant minorities and the Roma.

o The resolution stresses that traditional minorities need specific legal, linguistic, cultural, and social regimes and treatments beyond the fundamental rights and freedoms of the citizen. These measures have to be provided by the state.

o It emphasizes that both individual and collective rights shall be guaranteed for the traditional national minority communities.

o It calls on all member states to ratify the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities and the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages.

o It promotes the principles of subsidiarity and self-governance, power-sharing and co-decision, as the most effective ways of preventing conflicts and handling the problems of traditional national minority communities.

o It emphasizes that the EU’s multilingualism policy shall protect and promote regional and minority languages. In this respect it acknowledges the Commission's endeavour providing financial support to the education of language teachers, but calls for more efforts.

o It underlines the right of minorities to freely use their mother tongues and to receive an education in their mother tongue. It emphasizes the obligation of the state to guarantee that in the regions in which substantial numbers of a national minority are settled, minority language can be effectively used in the contacts with the administrative authorities

o It promotes the right of national minorities to have free contacts with the citizens and authorities of the kin-state, while duly respecting the territorial integrity of the state.

o Finally it stresses the need for a comprehensive and legally binding European Union protection system for traditional national and ethnic minorities and calls for the establishment of a European Framework of National Strategies on the Protection of Traditional National Minorities.

Annex 4

Member states of the EU where minority representatives are in the national or

regional government

On national level

• Finland - representatives of the Swedish speaking minority (Swedish People's

Party of Finland) - holding two ministerial positions: defence and justice

On regional level

• Germany - Schleswig-Holstein - representatives of the Danish minority

(South Schleswig Electors‘ Union (SSW) are part of the regional government;

• Italy - The Italian Constitution grants limited autonomous status to five

regions of the country where linguistic minorities are found: Friuli-Venezia

Giulia, Val d’Aosta, Trentino-Alto Adige, Sardinia, and Sicily;

• Spain - the Basque Country, Catalonia and Galicia have their own Legislative

Assembly whose members must be elected by citizens of the autonomous

region;