When the President sang a hit

Hans Heinrich Hansen: Back then, we were all optimistic. After the fall of the Iron Curtain, Eastern Europe was suddenly a priority. Many minorities in Eastern Europe were much worse off than we were in the West. So, it was clear that we had to help them reach the same level that we have in the West. The prerequisite for this was a learning process, for them, but also for us. I have always emphasised the importance of strengthening the self-esteem of minorities. There is always a tendency to see them as inferior; this also applies to them themselves. The aim is for minorities to be able to speak to the others on an equal footing.

Hansen: Since the war, everything we believed in has changed. All Eastern European minorities were a stimulating element at the FUEN congress, indeed, including the siyeable German minority in Russia. That is all gone.

Hansen: We have to realise that it could all be over in ten years. I still have very vivid memories of 2014. That was when it started in Ukraine, in the Donbass region and also Crimea as they were occupied by Russia. We had a meeting with the Turkish working group in FUEN in Ankara. The chairman of the Crimean Tatars approached me and said: What are we going to do now? I replied: I can only say one thing: no war, that won't make anything better. He had a job in Moscow, lived there part time, and he couldn't go back there anymore. Access to Crimea was also closed to him. And then you have to tell a person in this situation: we are powerless, because our strength lies in trying to resolve problems in a peaceful way. Because war is unthinkable for me.

Hansen: It was at the FUEN Congress in Ljubljana in 2010, when Gabriel von Toggenburg gave a lecture and said: There is a new mechansim coming in the EU, the European Citizens' Initiative. And everyone pricked up their ears. It was perfectly clear: this is the direction.

Hansen: No. We were naive enough to believe that such a European Citizens' Initiative would be legally secure because the means came from the European Parliament and was initiated from there. The Hungarians from Romania were a driving force. They wanted to achieve territorial autonomy like in South Tyrol. They have done and invested a great deal. From an optimistic point of view, that was a one-off. FUEN has rarely stood together like that. At the congress in Brixen/Bressanone in 2013, where the Minority SafePack was launched, the atmosphere was very positive because of this. I even performed as a singer there.

Hansen: It was instigated by the South Tyrolean FUEN Vice-President Martha Stocker and her assistant Astrid Pichler. The motto of the congress and the Minority SafePack was: ‘You are not alone. One million signatures for the diversity of Europe’. And there is this old German pop song called ‘You are not alone.’ So, I said: I'll think of something for that. And then I sat down in my hotel room and wrote a text to the tune of the song. And because the previous speakers had spoken for quite a long time, I had complete success with the few sentences of the song. The then South Tyrolean Governor Luis Durnwalder was quite surprised at the event in the cathedral square.

Hansen: Two months later, the EU Commission rejected our application on the grounds that the matter was completely outside the EU's competence. Through my contacts, I managed to get an appointment with the then Commissioner Frans Timmermans. He then explained the reasons to me clearly and said that the rejection was perfectly legal. Nevertheless, we decided to take legal action against it.

Hansen: Our legal adviser Frank de Boer did a tremendous job at the beginning in contesting this rejection. We then found Professor Ernst Johanssonn from Kiel, a great supporter of the idea of the European Union, who has been very committed to our case in court. The courts have then also confirmed that our case is perfectly in order.

Hansen: I fear so too. But we have a very competent man in our current lawyer, Thomas Hieber. Let's wait and see.

Hansen: I have the feeling that nationalism is blossoming again. If that is the case, it will be difficult for the minorities. You must be national yourselves, that is in the nature of things. That is the crux of the matter, because the nationalists use it to say: you are national too, so why can't we be? The problem with the EU is that it is an economic community. The buzzword ‘unity in diversity’ only applies to the economy. Subsidiarity, which was always praised, is being trampled underfoot. Decisions should be taken as close as possible to the people. Only the major framework decisions should be taken by the EU. But that was not adhered to.

Hansen: Of course. And above all it has led to the fact that the nations have not grown closer. Only the economy has grown closer. Politicians have always said: if the economy is running well, the interdependencies are such that there can be no war. But that is just not true. We have now seen that with Putin: the economic interdependencies with Russia have not prevented war.

Hansen: I am basically optimistic. But I am also realistic enough to see that the future will be difficult. And I am very concerned about another trend, the disappearance of minorities. I see this in my own family, too. My wife – who comes from Germany – and I have five children. For various reasons, only one of them managed to pass on German and Danish to his children; they are bilingual. In the case of our minority, there is another problem, namely that the German minority often uses a Danish dialect, Sønderjysk, as its vernacular. A professor who was a historian in Kiel once said: ‘A German North Schleswig native is someone who explains why he is German in Sønderjysk.’ During my time as chair, I always said: speak German, because language is an essential part of identity.

Hansen: Small minorities, such as our size in Southern Schleswig, will not have a chance of survival. Only larger ones like the German-speaking in South Tyrol have a chance.