Government: preserving national identity is a human right

It is vitally important that the issue of national minorities should be kept on the agenda of the Council of Europe (CoE), the foreign ministry’s state secretary responsible for security policy told parliament’s national cohesion committee.

Reporting on the Hungarian CoE presidency’s programmes focusing on national minorities, Péter Sztáray noted that during the Hungarian presidency between May and November 2021, 50 professional and 20 cultural events were held on the representation and development of the rights of national minorities. He added that the issue of national minorities

had got stuck in the Council of Europe,

which gave far more political attention to non-national minorities

Ferenc András Kalmár, the commissioner for neighbourhood relations, said the conferences held for ethnic research institutes and civil organisations focused on representing the interests of ethnic minority communities and legal practices in European institutions, as well as the guidelines determining future work.

• Read also: Hungarian CoE presidency prioritises minority protection

Katalin Szili, the prime minister’s commissioner for minority rights, highlighted the

importance of recognising the right to preserve national identity

as a “fifth-generation” human right. In a statement, she called on the European Parliament to enshrine in a declaration the rights of “indigenous minorities”.

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