Key debates at the 17th United Nations Forum on Minority Issues

The traditional 17th United Nations Forum on Minority Issues was held in Geneva on 28 and 29 November. The main organiser of the Forum is the United Nations Special Rapporteur on minority issues, Prof. Nicolas Levrat, a Swiss expert and former Vice-President of the Council of Europe’s Advisory Committee on the Implementation of the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities.

This year’s record number of almost 700 participants devoted most of the session to the issue of minorities in Africa, the Middle East and Asia, but some interventions also addressed the situation in Europe. Minority organisations as well as countries participate in the forum through their representatives on the UN Human Rights Council, which is based in Geneva.

This year there were not many interventions by diplomats from European countries. It is worth noting that Hungary was represented by Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó himself. He spoke about the Hungarians in Transcarpathia, i.e. the territory belonging to Ukraine, although he did not mention the country specifically. He said that this minority is not protected and that there are attempts to ban the use of the language in public, although it is taught in schools. „The international community has to intervene, this is not a bilateral issue,“ the minister stressed.

The Ukrainian representative, of course, focused on the issue of Russia, talking about the children abducted by Russians in Ukraine and now being assimilated. He said that international organisations should deal with this issue.

The representative of Austria, who took part in the debate on the media, took pride in the fact that minorities had more space on state television.

The ambassador of Slovenia explained the functioning of Italian and Hungarian minority schools.

Representatives of European minority organisations also took part in the discussion. The FUEN drew attention to the unacceptably negative attitude of the European Union towards the citizens’ initiative Minority SafePack, stressing that in the countries of the European Union about 50 million people, i.e. one tenth of the population, belong to minorities.

The organisation Minority Rights Group, which deals with the integration of Roma into society in some European countries, especially in the Balkans, focused mainly on the removal of obstacles that prevent minorities from fully expressing themselves culturally.

This time, ELEN focused on France, condemning the rejection of an application for a private radio station in Breton and the ban on the use of the Corsican language in the Corsican provincial assembly.

The Catalan organisation Òmnium Cultural has warned of the decline in the use of Catalan; a few years ago, 55 per cent of the population of Catalonia used the language regularly, now only 34 per cent do so; Spanish is also more widely used online, although Catalan is also available.

The Union of Turks of Western Thrace (ABTTF) focused on the issue of education. It accuses Greece of closing Turkish primary schools on the pretext of insufficient enrolment and of not granting permission to open bilingual kindergartens, although the minority has the means to maintain them.

The session was closed by the United Nations Special Rapporteur on minority issues, Nicolas Levrat, who expressed his satisfaction with the participation and the content of the discussion. He emphasised the democratic nature of the Forum, where representatives of minorities had the same space, i.e. two minutes, as representatives of countries. The purpose of a forum where „people we love meet people we don’t like“ is „to listen and also to act“. He commented on the statement of the Bangladeshi diplomat who assured the debate that his country was open to all journalists, and wished that it would also be open to the UN Special Rapporteur on Minorities. One of the rapporteur’s main limitations is that he can only visit those countries that explicitly invite him.

At the end of the session, Prof Levrat answered a few questions.