Yearbook of the BHRN 2006

8/20/2019 Yearbook of the BHRN 2006

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Editors-in-ChiefSnježana Ivandić

Aida Vežić

Managing Editors:Saša MadackiMiroslav Živanović

Bibliographic descriptionMaja KaljanacSaša Madacki

ProofreaderMorgiana Brading

PublisherBalkan Human Rights Network

Printed byNezavisne Novine, Banja Luka

ISSN1840-1473

© Balkan Human Rights Network – All Right Reserved


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YEARBOOK

of the

Balkan Human Rights Network

2006

EU Accession and Human Rights -Consequences, Tendencies and

the Role of Civil Society


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This publication was supported by the NeighbourhoodProgramme of the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Views expressed in the publication are those of theindividual authors.


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ContentsPreface............................................................................................................9

Contributors to this issue............................................................................. 10 Articles.......................................................................................................... 13

Neven AnđelićBig Wave .........................................................................................................................14

Miroslav Živanović

Bosnia and Herzegovina and Euro-integrations: The Case of “SignificantProgress” on Human Rights Front ............................................................................41

Antonija Petričušić

Pre-Accession Human Rights Record: Assessing the Scope ofConditionality in the Field of Human Rights Promotion and Protection inCroatia.............................................................................................................................72

Kumjana Novakova

EU integrations of Macedonia: the Human Rights Perspective and theRole of the Civil Society .............................................................................................102

Nenad Koprivica EU Accession and Human Rights: Consequences, tendencies and therole of the civil society in the accession process in Montenegro..........................131

Slaviša Raković

The Break Up of a Loose Union: What is Going On With Human Rightsand European Integrations Processes in Serbia and Montenegro After

Their Divorce? .............................................................................................................158

Srđan Dvornik Accession to European Union and human rights – the hopes for a morecivilised surrounding ...................................................................................................184

Maja Kaljanac Bibliography of Articles in Balkan Human Rights Yearbook 2001-2005............195

Snježana Ivandić & Aida Vežić

Report on the activities of the BHRN in the period July 2005 – August 2006................................................................................................ 209


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Preface

We would like to recommend you the sixth issue of the Balkan HumanRights Network Yearbook of Human Rights. Every year we strive to choose onetopic which is in the focus of the public discourse in the whole region. This year’sissue is “EU Accession and Human Rights – Consequences, Tendencies and theRole of Civil Society”.

BHRN Yearbook of Human Rights is a collection of essays written by therenowned regional experts who contribute with their analysis and opinions aboutthe given topic. Topics of the previous issues of the Balkan Yearbook of HumanRights have been: (Un)Even Partners Political Conditionality in Relations withthe Balkan Countries (2001), Police and Human Rights (2002), Human Rights

Education in the Balkans (2003), Minority Rights (2004) and Confronting withthe Past, Consequences for the Future (2005). Our wish is to continue producingrelevant analysis compiled in the BHRN Yearbook in the years to come.

Topic “EU Accession and Human Rights – Consequences, Tendencies andthe Role of Civil Society” is becoming more and more important as the date ofthe accession of our neighbours Romania and Bulgaria is approaching. All thecountries of the Western Balkans aspire to become member of the EU but toooften human rights perspective of that process is being overlooked. Asrepresentatives of the civil society we want to ask ourselves and our colleges what

role should we play in the process of joining the EU? This Yearbook is an effortto assess what we have all done until now and what lies ahead of us.

We would like to use this opportunity to thank the authors and stress theimportance of the financial support of the Royal Danish Ministry of Foreign

Affairs without which this publication would not have been possible.

Sarajevo, July 2006 Editors-in-ChiefSnježana Ivandić & Aida Vežić


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Contributors to this issue

Neven Anđelić

Neven Anđelić is a Fulbright Visiting Scholar at the University of California at Berkeley.Before leaving for Berkeley, he worked at the Center for Interdisciplinary PostgraduateStudies in Sarajevo. Neven Anđelić was educated in Sarajevo at the Faculty of Law and he worked as journalist in Sarajevo until 1993 when he moves to London. He was awardedboth MA and PhD degrees by the University of Sussex where he worked for one year. He worked for all major television stations in Britain and for many NGOs dealing with mediaissues, nationalism and human rights. He spent two years teaching Human Rights at theBirkbeck College - University of London and most of his time in London he worked forCNN International. He published one book on the end of communism and a rise of

nationalism in Bosnia-Herzegovina. He also published many articles in academic journals. Anđelić also occasionally contributes to some Bosnian mainstream media with his articles.


Miroslav Živanović is head of Library and Documentation Department of the HumanRights Centre of the University of Sarajevo. He graduated from the University of Sarajevoin comparative literature and librarianship and obtained his masters degree in statemanagement and humanitarian affairs from University of Sarajevo, University of Belgradeand University of Rome “La Sapienza”. He is library tutor at the Centre forInterdisciplinary Postgraduate Studies of the University of Sarajevo. His research prioritiesare human rights in Bosnia and Herzegovina, information and communication

technologies and human rights, civil society, etc. Recent publications include “Selectedbibliography on human rights” (In “Human Rights Reader”. Sarajevo: Human RightsCenter of the University of Sarajevo, 2001.); “Information and Communication Technologies in Human Rights Education: Case Study of Human Rights Center of theUniversity of Sarajevo” (In “Balkan Yearbook of Human Rights 2003: Human RightsEducation in the Balkans”. Tirana: Balkan Human Rights Network, 2003.); “TheConclusion of Working Group III” (In “Eight Years of Dayton BIH: New Visions forBosnia and Herzegovina?”. Sarajevo: Heinrich Boll Foundation, 2004.); “Human Rights ofElderly Persons in Bosnia and Herzegovina” (In “Protection of Rights of ElderlyPersons”. Podgorica: Human Rights Centre of the University of Montenegro, 2004.);“Social Capital Research as a Development Tool for Bosnia and Herzegovina” (A researchstudy prepared for Association BiH 2005 and presented at International Conference inGeneva, 20 – 21 October 2005);

Antonija Petričušić

Antonija Petričušić, MA is employed as a research assistant at the University of Graz. Sheis also a member of the working group on Justice and Human Rights of the Negotiating Team for the Accession of the Republic of Croatia to the European Union. Among herkey research interests are the accommodation of minorities, regional cooperation in the Western Balkans as well as public administration reform in the EU accession countries. Antonija was previously associated with the Institute for International Relations in Zagreb,Croatia, the Ministry of Justice of the Republic of Croatia and the European Academy of

Bolzano/Bozen, Italy. She graduated cum laude from the Faculty of Law at the University


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of Zagreb in 2001 and completed the European Regional Masters in Human Rights andDemocracy, organized by the University of Sarajevo and the University of Bologna in2002. Antonija Petričušić has published academic articles on human and minority rightsand regional cooperation in several international and Croatian publications (European

Yearbook on Minority Issues, European Diversity and Autonomy Papers, CroatianInternational Relations Review, Croatian Yearbook of European Law and Policy) and co-authored several books (Minorities in Democracy, Skopje: Konrad AdenauerFoundation/European Centre, 2005; Manjine i europske integracije, Split: Stina, 2005). Sofar, she has taken part in several international research projects, e.g. FP6 project "Humanand Minority Rights in the Life-Cycle of Ethnic Conflicts", "Access to Education, Trainingand Employment of Ethnic Minorities in the Western Balkans", "Institutions of TertiaryEducation in Central and South East Europe: Developments, Structures and Perspectivesof these Institutions for their Integration into the European Higher Education andResearch Area".

Kumjana NovakovaKumjana Novakova works at the Center for Interdisciplinary Postgraduate Studies of theUniversity of Sarajevo as an academic tutor at the European Regional Master’s Degree inDemocracy and Human Rights in South East Europe, implemented by the CIPS and theUniversity of Bologna. She graduated from the University of World and NationalEconomy in Sofia, Bulgaria, in International Relations, with specialization in Balkancountries. She obtained her Master’s Degree in Democracy and Human Rights in SEEfrom the University of Sarajevo and University of Bologna. She is also one of the projectcoordinators since the establishment of the Course on War Crimes, Genocide andMemories, implemented by the CIPS and organized at the Inter University Center inDubrovnik. She has coordinated the first human rights film festival Pravo Ljudski,

organized with partner festivals and institutions and implemented by the CIPS. Herresearch interests are ethnicity, nationalism, conflict resolution and post-conflict institutionbuilding in BiH, Kosovo and Macedonia, as well as national and postnational identityformation / transformation.

Nenad Koprivica

Nenad Koprivica is executive director of the Center for Democracy and Human Rights(CEDEM), Montenegro. He is also teaching assistant at the Faculty of Political Sciences inPodgorica. He graduated from the University of Montenegro, Law Faculty in Podgoricaand obtained his masters degree in European integration studies from University of Bonn,Center for European Integration Studies (ZEI) Germany. He is a PhD candidate at theFaculty of Political Sciences of the University of Zagreb, Croatia. His research prioritiesare European integrations in Montenegro, democracy and human rights, civil society, etc.Recent publications include “Montenegrin path towards joining EU” (In periodicalpublication of the Center for International Relations of the University of Zagreb, 2006.);“Anti discriminatory legislation in Montenegro” (A research study prepared for periodicalpublication published by Institute for Democracy, Skopje, Macedonia, 2005).

Slaviša Raković

Slaviša Raković works as the coordinator of the Documentation and Research Centre atthe Serbian Refugee Council in Belgrade. He holds a BA in Politics obtained from the

Faculty of Political Science in 2002, together with a BA in Arabic Literature obtained from


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the Faculty of Philology in 2004 (both at the University of Belgrade). In October 2005 he was awarded an MA in Human Rights from the Centre for Interdisciplinary PostgraduateStudies, University of Sarajevo. His MA thesis is a comparative case study on Roma peopleinclusion policies performed by the governments of Bosnia and Herzegovina and Serbia.

Slaviša Raković worked as a human rights consultant at the Helsinki Committee forHuman Rights in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and as a minority rights consultant for theBulgarian Association of Municipalities. Last three years he has been cooperating with anacademic magazine, ‘New Perspectives’, issued by the Association Alumni of the Centrefor Interdisciplinary Postgraduate Studies (Sarajevo). Various articles on multiculturalism,gender and European integration have thus far been published in this magazine. Hisarticle on the phenomena of denial of otherness in Croatia, Serbia and Bosnia andHerzegovina was published last year in the book ‘Nation States and Xenophobia’ issued bythe Peace Institute, Ljubljana. Mr Raković’s current research interests focus on forcedmigrations and asylum policies in the region of Southern Eastern Europe.

Srđan DvornikExecutive Director of the Croatian Helsinki Committee for Human Rights. Born in 1953in Šibenik, he graduated philosophy and sociology, and made his MA degree in politicalscience at the University in Zagreb. He taught at high schools and at the ZagrebUniversity, edited books in philosophy and social and political sciences, served as themanaging director and civil society programme deputy director at the Open SocietyInstitute Croatia, and as the head of the Zagreb Office of the Heinrich Böll Stiftung. His voluntary commitments include co-founding and active membership in civic organisationsfor human rights and democratic initiatives such as Association for Yugoslav DemocraticInitiative (1989), Anti-War Campaign (1991), Civic Initiative for Freedom of Public Speech(1992), Civic Committee for Human Rights (1992), independent anti-war magazine

ArkZin, Transition to Democracy (ToD) etc. He publishes articles, gives lectures andconducts educational workshops in the issues of democratic transition, human rights,'green politics', and development of civil society.His publications include several dozens articles on philosophical, sociological and politicalissues (including the issues of public sphere; media and public opinion; post-communisttransition and development of civil society), published in journals for social sciences andculture.


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Articles


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UDC 061.1EU:341.234(439)(458.2)(437.3)(474.2)(438)(474.5)(474.3)(564.3)(497.4)(437.6)

HRCC 43:29

Ottawa CSHRD EUR/X/EUINT V.700

Big Wave

by Neven Anđelić

Fulbright Visiting ScholarUniversity of California, Berkeley

Abstract This work presents the state of human rights in the countries of the Big Wave,i.e., the ten newest members of the European Union. As the space was restricted,it covers mainly areas of minority rights, education, language policy, media rightsand the right to political organising and representation. The overview of the

situation was widely known at the time of accession but many issues had beenignored. There is only one new member state that really did not have these issuesand it was the smallest one. The rest were given credits for improvements despitethe fact that some other countries at the time were criticised for similar policiestowards their minorities. Therefore this work presents possibilities for future

waves of new members whether to incorporate their minorities fully into theirsocieties or simply do with minor cosmetic changes. The argument in this work isthat it is unlikely though that the European Union would ever again allow newstates to become part of the Union with many human rights issues being on theborderline of successfully solved and unsolved. The argument in favour of

ignoring certain aspects is that the state of human rights has significantlyimproved in the countries of the Big Wave.

Keywords: European Union; minority rights, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia,Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia, Slovenia; regionalintegrations

The idea of a united Europe has taken long to come to a present shape while continuing to develop and expand. It had originated out of necessityand some progressive ideology, especially in a post-war Europe in a


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Big Wave

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desperate need of reconstruction and peace-building. The very idea couldbe traced even further back into history to the likes of a Bosnian versatileintellectual Dimitrije Mitrinovic and similar visionaries that are almost

forgotten today, or go even further into history, but this is not the subjectof this work.

What is of importance for this piece, however, is that Robert Schuman’s very idea of united Europe has been compromised along its way ofexpansion and inclusion. It is fairly easy to argue that some of the mainissues have been sacrificed for economic reasons of expanding Europe’sfree markets. The field of human rights is a major victim as many issueshave been ignored in order to broaden the European family as planned in

2004. One could argue that consequently this might lead to thedestruction of the very idea and corrupt the whole process. It is alsopossible to argue in the completely opposite way that temporarily relaxed view on human rights will in the long term help speed up progressivesolutions in this field and help strengthen institution building in the newmember states that will secure human rights for all.

In this article, one will be able to find analysis of the state of affairs in thefield of human rights in each of the ten newest countries in the EuropeanUnion. Some comparisons will be provided to the older member states as well as a comparison to aspiring countries. As the field of human rights is very broad and the space is restricted, one should concentrate on thenarrower aspects of minority protection and language policies in thesecountries. This method should shed some light on hypocritical view takenby the European Union’s institutions when considering and deciding uponmembership applications by the countries concerned.

Thus after a brief period of the process of unification of Germany in theearly 1990s, the European Union for the first time does not have

recognized borders. Cyprus is an obvious example but a little known caseof Slovenia and its lasting border dispute with Croatia who is not amember state yet, makes the EU a party to the issue of solving borderproblems. Problems of Russian speaking minorities in the Baltic republicsin obtaining a mere citizenship are a serious issue that is again overlookedas is the trouble of the Roma population in the Czech and SlovakRepublics.

Hungary has a large number of ethnic Hungarians residing in countries

outside the European Union. Poland is again the case of a state whose


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borders shifted westwards during the course of the twentieth century thatleft many Poles in present day Russia Ukraine, Belarus and the Balticrepublics, while Germans were forced or suggested to flee following the

Second World War. Their property issues, as well as those in the presentday Czech Republic, are yet to be solved.

Thus tiny Mediterranean island of Malta seems to be the only one of theten new member states of the European Union that does not haveproblems with issues of human rights. This is, of course, seemingly thestate of affairs within the countries of the ‘Big Wave’. The reality mightdiffer from the original point of view. Therefore a closer inspection ofmore human rights issues is needed before drawing conclusions in general.

The states have some common features between themselves but there arealso some unique problems.

If one takes minority issues as an example, it is obvious that the states inquestion differ. ‘Domestic laws of Hungary, Czech Republic and someother countries consider as minorities only domestic citizens. Estonia,Poland and some other countries also consider as minorities onlydomestic citizens according to reservations they have expressed towardsthe Framework Convention for the Protection of national Minorities.’1

Three states at the north of Europe by the Baltic Sea are often viewed as a‘package’ and in many documents they are referred to as the “BalticRepublics’. They do share plenty of history, especially during the Sovietera, and many issues are common for all of them. However, they also haveplenty of distinctions that should be analysed separately. Lithuanianhistory is more shared by other European countries as the history ofPolish-Lithuanian state interconnects these two but also some otherEuropean powers with past interests in the region like Russia, Austria andSweden. The consequence of these historical periods was a mixture of

ethnic groups residing in the area.

Two world wars in the twentieth century actually ensured a ‘lithuanisation’of the territory and it was not always the Lithuanians that could be blamedfor a kind of ‘ethnic cleansing’. Three ethnic groups, Germans, Jews andPoles were primarily the victims in the long term of the processes duringand immediately after these wars. The Lithuanians played a minor part in

1 Krivokapic, B., ‘Zastita manjina u medjunarodnom i uporednom pravu . Knjiga 1’, (Ministarstvo za ljudska i

manjinska prava Srbije i Crne Gore, Novi Sad: 2004) pp.186-191


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the world of geopolitics but the consequences of some bigger players’decisions ensured a nation-state of Lithuania as it is known today. Thisminor historical excursion is important for an easier understanding of the

present state and ethnic composition of Lithuania. The other importantperiod is a Soviet era as the practices of the communist regime played animportant role in forming the state of mind of many generations and wereonly partially reformed before the state’s entry into the European Union.

Thus it was on these grounds that the present Lithuanian society and thestate were formed. Following its application to join the European Unionthe Lithuanians had to change and adopt a number of legislative measures,many of which had to provide for equal rights. The main argument of this

piece is that in many cases, less in the case of Lithuania than in someother cases, the Union’s officials did forego an unclear state of humanrights in the candidate countries up until 2004 because of their majorconcern to expand the community, the common market as it was anecessity, bring more workforce and potential customers and finally tosecure its eastern borders more firmly.

Lithuania is not ethnically diverse like the other Baltic republics as 83.5percent of its citizens are Lithuanians while the biggest minorities arePoles (6.7%) and Russians (6.3%).2 As this work is not supposed toexplain historical justice and injustice towards certain ethnic groups, forthe state of human rights in the present day Lithuania, one should look atthe rights and freedoms enjoyed by present day minorities. The Law onCitizenship passed in 1989, just before the independence, gave the right tocitizenship to any non-Lithuanian residing in the country irrespective ofhis or her duration of stay. After the independence in 1991, the new lawrestricted those rights to those with permanent employment or someother legal source of income residing for at least ten years in the country with the passed exam in knowledge of Lithuanian language and the

Constitution. Despite such a restrictive law (although it seems to bebecoming a European Union members’ norm) only 0.3 percent of peopleliving in Lithuania have no citizenship at all.3

2 National Census of Lithuania 20013 Euromosaic,http://ec.europa.eu/education/policies/lang/languages/langmin/euromosaic/lith_en.pdf, visited on

17th May 2006.


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Some patterns found in Lithuania are not unique but could also be foundin Latvia. More importantly, however, there are many issues that are ofgreat concern for human rights analysis that have been developed in

Latvia since its independence. The Latvians constitute just over a half ofthe population in their nation-state and the society is very much dividedon Latvian speakers and Russian speaking minority. One should add tothis group a large percentage of ‘non-citizens’ as many Russian speakers were not given the citizenship because of failing to attend or pass theexam for citizenship consisting of the Latvian language test and history ofLatvia test where certain answers confront ideological view on Latvianand Soviet past among Russians in Latvia.

At the time of joining the European Union, Latvia had a population of2,309,339 while some 58.7 percent of citizens were ethnic Latvians.4 Therest of the population was mainly Russians and Russian speaking otherethnic minorities like Belarusians, Ukrainians and even Poles.5 When thesenumbers are compared with the details of an ethnic composition of Latviain 1989, there is a pattern showing a decreasing number of Russians livingin Latvia.6 The reasons for this were not only a willing minority members withdrawing with the Soviet empire but a very restrictive Law onCitizenship adopted by Latvian authorities and still not changed enough toaccommodate a large part of residents in this country. According to thesame source, out of the total number of Russians residing in Latvia which was 664,092 at the time of joining the European Union, only 330,201 were actually citizens of Latvia. The situation was even worse with regardsto Ukrainians and Belarusians although the absolute numbers were muchlower.7

The decision by the Supreme Council of the Republic of Latvia in 1991 by which a citizenship was to be restored only to those residing within therepublic between the two world wars and their descendants could not bejustified without a nationalistic rhetoric. This system has gradually beenchanged during the decade preceding to 2004 but generally the Law on

4 http://www.eu.int/comm/education/policies/lang/languages/langmin/euromosaic/lat_en.pdf , visited on 18th May 20065 http://www.eu.int/comm/education/policies/lang/languages/langmin/euromosaic/lat_en.pdf ,

visited on 18th May 20066 http://ec.europa.eu/education/policies/lang/languages/langmin/euromosaic/lat_en.pdf , visited on18th May 2006; some 902.300 Russians in 1989 compared to 664,082 Russians in 2004 according tothe Board for Citizenship and Migration Affairs7 http://ec.europa.eu/education/policies/lang/languages/langmin/euromosaic/lat_en.pdf , visited on

18th May 2006


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Citizenship is still one of the most restrictive and, one could relativelyeasily argue, non-democratic legislative features in contemporary Europe.

Thus Latvia still has some 470,220 ‘non-citizens’ and 467,733 of them arenot ethnic Latvians.8 It is reflected in the electoral results as only 18 out of100 members of the Parliament are ethnic non-Latvians despite the factthat these various groups actually comprise almost a half of its citizens. According to some estimates, at the last local elections in 2005, some450,000 people were not allowed to vote.9 Therefore it is not surprising tofind out that a leading politician who was the Head of the Parliament’sForeign Affairs Committee suggested that ‘…all unwanted foreigners would be herded on to trains and shipped back to their “homeland” –

with brass band playing on the platform to see them off’.10

Estonia has more similarities to its neighbour Latvia than to any othercountry of the ‘Big Wave’. Beside the communist and Soviet heritage incultural and economic spheres, they also ‘inherited’ a significant part ofthe population that had immigrated from Russia. The overall situation with the Russian minority, however, bears some important differences. The population in general has decreased since the independence due to alower birthrate but also to a significant wave of emigration among allethnic groups.

One should notice, though, that the percentage of Estonians emigrating was still lower than Russians or other minorities and therefore despite thefact that the absolute number of Estonians decreased, their relativenumber is higher.11 According to the latest census figures, Estoniansrepresent 67.9 percent of the society while Russians make up 25.6percent.12 Some small minorities like Belarusians and Ukrainians should beadded to a group of Russian speaking minority that makes almost a thirdof the population. The difference to Latvia is that almost half of those

actually speak Estonian. There is a tradition to it as well because as farback as in 1925, the Estonian Parliament passed a legislature that allowed

8 http://ec.europa.eu/education/policies/lang/languages/langmin/euromosaic/lat_en.pdf , visited on18th May 20069 Sunday Herald, 13th March 2005, http://www.sundayherald.com/4831310 Sunday Herald, 13th March 2005, http://www.sundayherald.com/4831311 http://ec.europa.eu/education/policies/lang/languages/langmin/euromosaic/et_en.pdf , visitedon 22nd May 200612 Estonian national census of 2000


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ethnic minorities to run their own educational and cultural affairs which was a rather unique feature in the then Europe.

Present day Estonia imposed a restricted Citizenship Law which requiresproficiency in Estonian. Therefore just 141,907 out of 351,178 Russiansliving in the country are actually citizens of Estonia. Further 133,346Russians are with undetermined citizenship while others have eitherRussian or some other country’s citizenship.13 Most of the Russians live inthe capital Tallinn and northeastern areas where in some parts theyactually represent a majority. Thus one could see that all three small Balticrepublics imposed rather restrictive laws on citizenship. Despite manysimilar features in these laws, one should notice very different policies

towards minorities in these countries as it will be explained in detail later. These kinds of laws on citizenship might have been relatively unique inEurope of early 1990s but nowadays some old and large democracies likeGreat Britain and Germany imposed similar laws that require languageproficiency and knowledge of culture.

With the accession of the Baltic republics, the European Union hasbecome richer also by a large number of non-citizens as residents. Thisissue remains to be solved, as it was already explained. Another problemthat has yet to be solved is the frontiers of the Union because with theaccession of Cyprus and Slovenia this became an issue. The division ofCyprus and a failed reunification of the country have left northern part ofthis island out of the European Union despite the expressed will of itsinhabitants at the referendum. The Greek south that had expressed areservation towards the way unification was proposed was actuallyadmitted into the Union. History of the island has importance for thepresent situation in so far as the fact of two communities, Greek and Turkish, living side by side. Turkish invasion of the island and a separationof the two communities since 1974 had made the basis for the

contemporary problems.

The European Commission against Racism and Intolerance in its mostrecent report sheds proper light on many issues that should have actuallybeen solved long before Cyprus’s accession into the European Union.Immigrants and asylum seekers are particularly vulnerable groups thatremain largely unprotected. The issue of greatest importance for this EU

13 http://ec.europa.eu/education/policies/lang/languages/langmin/euromosaic/lat3_en.html#11 ,

visited on 22nd May 2006


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member is certainly relations between the two country’s ethnic groups. Asthe report states: ‘Manifestations of prejudice and discrimination affecting Turkish Cypriots still need to be adequately recognised and dealt with.

The position of other groups vulnerable to disadvantage, racism and racialdiscrimination, such as Roma and Pontian Greeks, also needs to beaddressed more effectively.’14

With a somewhat relaxed regime of crossing the division line in Cyprus,there is an increasing number of Turks who come in contact with the(Greek) Cypriot authorities and discrimination against them is notuncommon. There is a fine example in the decision of the European

Court of Human Rights in the case of Aziz v. Cyprus in which it was heldunanimously that there had been a violation of a right to free elections anda violation of prohibition of discrimination.15 The Greek Cypriotauthorities originally have claimed that Turks from Cyprus have toexercise their electoral rights within the Turkish community of thecountry. Similar cases are not uncommon and do very little favour to anattempted unification of the island. The European Commission againstRacism and Intolerance found in its report that ‘Turkish Cypriots alsoexperience problems of racism and racial discrimination. There have beeninstances of harassment and ill-treatment of Turkish Cypriot citizens bythe police. Turkish Cypriots are also reported to have experienceddisproportionate difficulties in securing services from theadministration.’16

Another part of the European Union with undetermined frontiers isSlovenia. The border dispute with Croatia, both on land and on sea, isconstantly deteriorating relations between the two countries. Ever sinceindependence in 1991, the border problems in several places have notbeen solved. Thus, alongside internal divisions on the island of Cyprusand their unsolved problems of organising the state, this is another area

14 Third ECRI’s report on Cyprus adopted on 16 December 2005 and made public on 16 May 2006,http://www.coe.int/T/E/human_rights/Ecri/1-ECRI/2-Country-by-country_approach/Cyprus/Cyprus_CBC_3.asp#P87_7791 , visited on 23rd May 200615 European Court of Human Rights judgment in the case of Aziz v. Cyprus (application no. 69949/01)published on internethttp://www.echr.coe.int/Eng/Press/2004/June/ChamberJudgmentAzizvCyprus220604.htm , visitedon 23rd May 200616 ECRI’s Third Rreport on Cyprus adopted on 16 December 2005 and made public on 16 May 2006,http://www.coe.int/T/E/human_rights/Ecri/1-ECRI/2-Country-by-

country_approach/Cyprus/Cyprus_CBC_3.asp#P87_7791 visited on 23rd May 2006


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where the borders of the European Union are not clear. One should leaveaside this problem as it is highly unlikely the relations between theneighbours could deteriorate further. The real problem is the status of

Slav minorities in the country including a treatment and a lack ofrecognition status for Croatian minority in Slovenia. The actual numbersof Croats are hard to determine because there is a strong presence ofSerbs as well as Bosniaks who are often mistaken for each other becauseof linguistic and cultural similarities. There will be a more detailed analysisof their status later.

Slovenia has more specifics than other post-communist countries withinthe ‘Big Wave’. The tradition and heritage of the ‘Yugoslav way’ in general

and Slovenian jurisdiction and tradition in particular left Slovenianminorities with very broad and positive protection. According to thepresent Constitution there are two autochthonous minorities: Hungariansand Italians who represent really small communities. There are only 0.31percent of Hungarians among 1,964,036 citizens of Slovenia. The numberof Italians is even lower and presents only 0.11 percent of the totalpopulation.17 The members of these two communities, however, enjoyrights far greater than members of much more numerous minoritycommunities in the rest of the “Big Wave’ countries.

Slovenia is just one, as it will be shown, of many countries with Hungarianminority on its territory. This is an issue for these countries but also forHungary itself. Following the two world wars that Hungary ended up onlosing sides, it lost significant parts of the territory, roughly two thirds,and consequently many Hungarians, some 60 percent, were left outsidethe country. Some historical problems and frictions are left out of thisanalysis but the recent accession of Hungary into the European Unionmeans that, apart from those Hungarians that are actually citizens of yetanother new member state – Slovakia, there are many ethnic Hungarians who are citizens of Serbia, Romania or Ukraine and thus left out of theEuropean Union. Some estimates claim that ‘2.5 million ethnicHungarians live in neighbouring states, 1.4 million of them in Romania,560,000 in Slovakia, 300,000 in Serbia and 150,000 in Ukraine’.18

17 http://ec.europa.eu/education/policies/lang/languages/langmin/euromosaic/slov_en.pdf , visitedon 24th May 200618 Dr Michael B. Weinstein ‘Hungary's Referendum on Dual Citizenship: A Small Victory forEuropeanism’ published on internet:http://www.threemonkeysonline.com/threemon_article_hungarian_citizenship_referendum_ethnic_

hungarians_dual_citizenship.htm , visited on 29th May 2006


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As a nationalist dream of a Greater Hungary had to be abandoned forgood during the processes of European and Atlantic integrations, theremaining part of this nationalist rhetoric is a project ‘nation above

borders’ that was underlined in the referendum on dual citizenship on 5 th December 2004. It is interesting that the referendum was not initiated bypolitical circles within the Hungary but by the World Federation ofHungarians, a non-governmental organisation dedicated to protection ofthe Hungarian diaspora and the nation-above-borders idea. They managedto get required 200,000 signatories of the voters in Hungary and thus putthe proposal on offer to the nation.

The results of the referendum failed to satisfy nationalists in Hungary as

less than the required 25 percent of the registered voters, i.e., 51% of the38% that actually voted, were in favour of granting dual citizenship toethnic Hungarians living outside the country. Some neighbouring states,Romania in particular, were more than concerned with the whole issueand the bilateral relations suffered. Even the European Commission feltthe need to settle the issue by stating: ‘it was the full right of Hungary tohave a referendum on citizenship.’19 This issue reflects permanent dangerthat unresolved problems from the European past can potentially presentfor European integrative processes.

The ten new members of the European Union could be placed intosmaller separate groups according to different major human rights issues. While Latvia, Estonia and, to a lesser degree, Lithuania are concerned withRussian speaking ‘non-citizens’, Cyprus and Slovenia have to deal withborders that are not recognized by majority of their population, Malta hasno minority issues while Poland’s are insignificant when compared to therest of this ‘club’. Hungary, Czech Republic and Slovakia have large Romaminorities and different sets of policies to accommodate these groups.

Some three percent of people living in Hungary declare themselves as oneof 13 national minorities.20 It is interesting that there is no law declaringHungarian as the official language of the country. There are legal groundsfor the protection of minorities in the Minorities Act of 1993. Accordingto this act, they are entitled to all political rights, protection of their

19 Dr Michael B. Weinstein ‘Hungary's Referendum on Dual Citizenship: A Small Victory forEuropeanism’ published on internet: http://www.threemonkeysonline.com/article2.php?id=175 ,

visited on 29th May 200620 National Census of Hungary 2001


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culture, use of their native languages including in education and all theinstances of public and private life. They all have the right to education intheir own languages or bilingually according to possibilities in particular

area.

The most interesting situation is with the most numerous, Roma minority. While less than fifty thousand citizens of Hungary declared themselves asRoma, the estimates are that there is around five hundred thousand Romapeople in this country. The specific way of life mostly contributes to thisdiscrepancy as it is not unusual that members of this group avoid certainbureaucratic procedures and therefore remain unaccounted for. There isalso an understandable fear among this community to actually declare

themselves as Roma because of the widespread prejudice towards themstill present in Hungarian society like it is in many others.

The UN Committee on the Rights of the Child ‘expressed concern thatmany Roma children are still arbitrarily placed in special institutions orclasses.’21 They also found huge regional disparities in the quality ofschools. There is a limited access to nurseries and preschools in regions where Roma population is dominant and poverty is widespread.Segregation in schools is continued at the expense of Roma children.

According to the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languagesof the Council of Europe in 2004, minority education may be organised inthree ways. The first and rarest one is when minority language is used forall subjects except in the classes of official (Hungarian in this case)language and literature. The second option is a bilingual education in which at least 50 percent of the classes must be conducted in minoritylanguage. The third type that is the most common in Hungary is used inschools where all the classes are in Hungarian while the minority language

is studied by pupils for a certain number of hours which cannot be lowerthan four a week. The reasons for dominance of this type of educationcould be found in the field of demographic spread of minorities and ahigh level of linguistic assimilation in Hungary.

It is widely recognised that Roma people live in special conditions andtherefore the state provided a Roma Press Centre for the dissemination ofthe information. Probably more important is the role of the Public Service

21 European Roma rights Centre; http://www.errc.org/cikk.php?cikk=2133 , visited on 26th May 2006


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which broadcasts special programmes in Romani on regular basis. Radioprogrammes are daily feature while there is a weekly televisionprogramme. The Hungarian state is faced with similar problem as some

other states in trying to integrate Roma population into the society.Linguistically most of the Roma speak Hungarian as their native languagebut other attempts in integrating Roma were less successful. One couldquestion this linguistic shift towards Hungarian among Roma people butit is more likely that circumstances in the society and not some specificstate’s policy led them towards this result.

There are state funded weekly newspapers in Croatian, German,Romanian, Serbian, Slovenian and Slovak. They all also receive public

service broadcasting in a way of special programmes in their ownlanguages on weekly basis both on radio and television. Their associationsare also helped by the state to some extent either in general or in some ventures.

The Roma people living in the Czech Republic could only desirepossibilities, despite all the difficulties, their fellow Roma enjoy inHungary. The latest Amnesty International report states that ‘Romacontinued to suffer discrimination at the hands of public officials and

private individuals’.22

The fields in which discrimination against Romapeople continues are employment, housing and education. Violent attacksby racist individuals are frequent.23 The practice in rental markets makes italmost impossible for Roma to obtain housing while local authorities do,in many cases, their best to make it even harder for economicallyunderprivileged Roma to get on housing lists. They also tend to evictthem whenever possible excuse is found.24

The situation in education is probably even worse. The European Court

of Human Rights admitted a complaint filed by 18 Roma schoolchildrenagainst the Czech Republic. They were placed in schools for mentallydisabled children which is not uncommon practice in this country. Thusthey face segregation quite often rather than attempts of integration intothe Czech society. During the process of a so called ‘Ostrava Case’, ‘thechildren asked the Court's highest body-the Grand Chamber-to review the

22 http://web.amnesty.org/report2006/cze-summary-eng , visited on 25th May 200623 http://web.amnesty.org/report2006/cze-summary-eng , visited on 25th May 200624 http://web.amnesty.org/report2006/cze-summary-eng , visited on 25th May 2006


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case because of its potential to establish precedent and its broadsignificance for all of Europe’s minority groups’.25

There are many reports of ill-treatment by the police. One should bear inmind that beside Roma, other vulnerable minority groups are faced withthe same problem. Some women took legal action against hospitalsalleging forced sterilisation. Among this group many were Roma women. This practice was confirmed in the Ombudsman’s review of the practice.26 The report states that ‘the Ombudsman is convinced that in the CzechRepublic, the problem of sexual sterilization – carried out either withunacceptable motivation or illegally – exists, and that Czech society standsbefore the task of coming to grips with this reality.27

There are all indications that Roma are marginalised from the mainstreamCzech society through a kind of ghettoisation in the outskirts of townsand cities within a poor housing environment. The children are oftenforced into special schools for mentally disabled and a disproportionatenumber of Roma children are placed in state institutions or foster care.Roma suffer both from youth yob who physically attack them and fromthe police which occasionally uses racially motivated violence and ill-treatment of Roma in detention.28

The Czech’s Roma go through the process of linguistic assimilation,especially younger generations. The problem with the use of Romanilanguage in public is created less by the state administration and more bythe widespread racism, which is often very hard to prove, among Czechpopulation. But the fact is that a significant number of Romani Czechcitizens sought political asylum in Great Britain during the period ofaccession talks claiming persecution on racial grounds. This even ledxenophobic demonstrations in Britain where demonstrators demandedfrom British authorities ban on entry of Roma people into the country. Another problem for Roma in the Czech Republic is a non-homogeneouslinguistic background as they do not have a standardized language. This isan additional problem in educating young Roma children which comes on

25 European Roma Rights Center http://www.errc.org/cikk.php?cikk=2591 , visited on 26th May 200626 http://web.amnesty.org/report2006/cze-summary-eng , visited on 25th May 200627 European Roma Rights Centre; http://www.errc.org/cikk.php?cikk=2541 , visited on 26th May200628 http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGEUR010122005?open&of=ENG-CZE , visited on

26th May 2006


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top of racial prejudice widespread among majority of the population.Broadcasting for Roma people is also affected by this fact.

Some languages of the recognised eleven national minorities in the CzechRepublic are more widely spoken than others. They all show signs ofdecreasing numbers of their speakers with the exception of Germanalthough this minority also went through the process of languageassimilation. The members of this, like some others, minority aredispersed throughout the country and thus make it impossible to organiseeducation in German for members of this group. It is only some privateschools that are organized with special classes in German as a kind ofmulticultural educational organisations. Therefore, one could conclude

that new developments with this minority lead towards bilingualism ratherthan development of a separate linguistic identity.

A part of the Polish community is concentrated in one particular regionand therefore education was easily organised in Polish language at pre-school, primary and secondary level. Several newspapers are published with somewhat strange rhythm of being distributed every other day. Theethnic organisations are helped by the state but the overall number ofPolish speakers is decreasing as one of the signs that the community is

becoming more bilingual and bicultural, if not multicultural.

Roma are facing similar conditions of life and discrimination against inboth states of the former Czechoslovakia. In the ConcludingObservations of the UN Human Rights Committee one could find a‘serious concern about discrimination against Slovakia’s 500,000 Roma inthe fields of education, employment, housing, health, social care andaccess to services’.29 The Slovak government had a rather racist responseto such findings stating that ‘they come to school without pre-school

education and sufficient knowledge of Slovak, lack basic hygiene andcultural and working skills, have limited concentration, patience andperseverance, and have underdeveloped fine motor coordination, differentexperience and knowledge of the world, and different interests and felt

29 http://web.amnesty.org/report2006/svk-summary-eng , visited on 25th May 2006


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needs.’30 In some areas, up to 80% of Roma children attend specialschools.31

There is a ban on affirmative action towards Roma which means inpractice that special measures to improve access to education andemployment have to be stopped. Housing is filled with a wide range ofdiscriminatory measures taken against Roma by local authorities in someparts of Slovakia. At the unofficial level, there were reported cases ofpressure and intimidation by local population against Roma citizens andeven cases of burning down their houses.32 On the positive side, Slovakiais, alongside Sweden, Slovenia and Poland, the only country that includedRomani in the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages.

Some 15 percent of the Slovak population are not ethnic Slovaks.33 Thenumber might be higher as many Roma declared themselves as eitherHungarian or Slovak and the estimates are that there is between 300,000and 500,000 Roma in Slovakia which takes minority percentage to over 20of the total population.34 Slovakian is the official language of the state butin the regions where certain minority represents more than 20 percent ofthe total population they are entitled to use their language in contact withauthorities. There is a problem as precise definition of national minority is

lacking in Slovak legislature although in practice and according to theFramework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities thereare 11 minority groups in the country.

The law provides for the minority groups to be educated in their nativelanguage. But this law does not mention Roma as beneficial to this rightbecause they are considered, by the Slovak authorities, as ‘not interested inbeing taught in their own language’.35 There were, however, someinstances of use of Romani language in schools during the school-year2002-2003 but it was mainly in nurseries in dominant Roma areas and as

30 http://web.amnesty.org/report2006/svk-summary-eng , visited on 25th May 200631 http://ec.europa.eu/education/policies/lang/languages/langmin/euromosaic/slok3_en.html ,

visited on 26th May 200632 http://web.amnesty.org/report2006/svk-summary-eng , visited on 25th May 200633 National Census of Slovakia 200134 http://ec.europa.eu/education/policies/lang/languages/langmin/euromosaic/slok_en.pdf , visitedon 26th May 200635 http://ec.europa.eu/education/policies/lang/languages/langmin/euromosaic/slok_en.pdf , visited

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an auxiliary language at one secondary school and at one university.36 During the 2004-2005 school-year, Romani was to be taught at twoprimary, two secondary and two grammar schools.37

The law provides for the possibility of using minority languages in mediabut it has yet to be developed. There are a very limited number of hourson radio and television broadcast in German while one monthly periodicalis published in German. It is very different situation with Hungarians inSlovakia who publish daily newspaper and a weekly in a relatively highcirculation. A number of German and Hungarian periodicals andnewspapers are available in Slovakia as are radio and television stationsfrom neighbouring countries. There are also numerous local electronic

media broadcasting in Hungarian as is the state broadcasting operator who provides many hours in Hungarian.

Hungarian population are in better situation than other minorities inSlovakia which is proven even by the fact that they are represented onnational level with 20 members of the Parliament and three governmentministers. Hungarian is used in education especially in areas withdominant Hungarian population. German population is ageing anddecreasing but the interest in learning the language and being educating inGerman is actually increasing because of the business needs under thechanged circumstances in Slovakia.

Poland is a rather homogeneous country with between two and fourpercent of the population being non-Polish. The issue of national identitynevertheless remains of great relevance in the society because of its pastand the present requirements of the modern day Europe. Department fornational minorities exists within the Ministry of Internal Affairs since2000. The minorities are given right to preserve and develop their ownlanguage, culture and customs according to the Constitution.38 Furthermore, Poland has signed bilateral agreements with manyneighbouring countries with regards to minority issues.

36 http://ec.europa.eu/education/policies/lang/languages/langmin/euromosaic/slok_en.pdf , visitedon 26th May 200637 http://ec.europa.eu/education/policies/lang/languages/langmin/euromosaic/slok3_en.html ,

visited on 26th May 200638 Article 35. of the Polish Constitution


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The official numbers of minority members are lower than estimatesprovided by nongovernmental organisations but it does not makesituation worse for the minorities. It certainly reflects psychological

reasoning of some minority members to keep quiet about theirbackground because the lessons from the past have been learned asPoland has lost most of its minorities during the twentieth century.

It was not only history that influenced the decrease in minorities’ numbersin Poland. Assimilation is the process rapidly taking places over the recentpast during which many Belarusians disappeared. Self-consciousness ofthis group is very low but it has more to do with Belarus nation as a wholeand less as a specific development in Poland. German minority was not

recognized during the communist era but since then there is a kind of arevival of this group. Although the numbers are low and a separate groupof Silesians is established, there are two members of the state parliamentfrom the German ethnic group and many at the local level.

Polish Supreme Court has refused to acknowledge either national orethnic minority status to the Silesians. The European Court of HumanRights confirmed this national decision in its judgment on 17 February2004 by stating: ‘The Grand Chamber agreed with the Chamber thatrefusing to register the association as an “organisation of the Silesiannational minority” interfered with the applicants’ right to freedom ofassociation and that the interference was justified.’39 This seems to be anincidental example of a somewhat restrictive state policy towardsminorities in Poland.

In Lithuania, the minorities are legally protected with regards to the use oftheir languages and the right to receive information in their nativelanguages. Russian is used as a mother tongue by some 96 percent ofRussians, half of Ukrainians and a third of Poles and Jews.40 There is a

broad range of legal instruments in guaranteeing and protecting minorityrights in Lithuania. Article 14 of the Constitution sets Lithuanian as a statelanguage41 while other provisions are being made to secure use of minority

39 European Court of Human Rights decision published on internet:http://www.echr.coe.int/Eng/Press/2004/Feb/GrandChamberJudgmentGorzelikvPoland.htm

visited on 22nd May 200640 Euromosaic,http://ec.europa.eu/education/policies/lang/languages/langmin/euromosaic/lith_en.pdf

visited on 17th May 200641 Constitution of the Republic of Lithuania


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languages. Thus Article 45 of the Constitution describes the independenceof ‘national communities of citizens’ in managing affairs related to theirculture, education, charity and mutual assistance and that the state shall

provide support to those communities whilst not explaining what exactlyare ‘national communities’ and thus leaving it open to interpretation.

The practice shows that criticism should be spared because all legalinstruments are in place in case some of the minorities or members ofminority groups felt discriminated against. The schools are being providedfor children in Polish and Russian while there are even some Jewish andBelarus schools for these two tiny communities. Although one couldnotice a decreasing pattern of the number of schoolchildren being taught

in Russian since 1991, there is an increase of the number of childrenattending tuition in Polish leaving thus little space for speculating. It isobvious that certain number of Russians left the country since theindependence and that some Russians opted for their children to betaught in Lithuanian but for those who wish so, education in thelanguages of the main minorities is secured. There were 76,038schoolchildren in Russian schools in 1991, while there were 41,162 in2001.42 During the same period, the number of children instructed inPolish rose from 11,407 to 22,303 and the number of schoolchildren inLithuanian language schools rose from 409,295 to 522,569.43 As Russian isthe second language in this country, it is important to emphasiseprovisions of the Amendment of the Law on Education in 2003 by whicha possibility to use Russian in education was guaranteed.

There is one daily, five weeklies and three monthly newspapers publishedin Russian in Lithuania. The national broadcaster provides some newsbulletins in Russian while local operators and commercial stationsbroadcast some programmes in Russian in the areas with largerconcentration of this minority. The Russians are also politically organized

in two major groups and there are three Russian members of Lithuanianparliament elected on the list of Social-democratic Coalition.44 One should

42 Euromosaic,http://ec.europa.eu/education/policies/lang/languages/langmin/euromosaic/lith_en.pdf , takenfrom the Lithuanian Foreign Policy Review (Motuzas 2001), visited on 17th May 200643 Euromosaic,http://ec.europa.eu/education/policies/lang/languages/langmin/euromosaic/lith_en.pdf , takenfrom the Lithuanian Foreign Policy Review (Motuzas 2001), visited on 17th May 200644 Euromosaic,http://ec.europa.eu/education/policies/lang/languages/langmin/euromosaic/lith2_en.html , visited

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also bear in mind that one Polish member was elected to the Parliamenton the same list while two Poles were elected from the list of LiberalDemocrats.

The Polish language speakers are in an even better situation than Russiansas traditional historical ties between the two nations were reaffirmedduring the processes of integration into the European Union. Beside theschools providing tuition in Polish language, one daily newspaper andseveral periodicals, there is also a radio broadcast and a TV show onnational television that provide service for this minority. Furthermore, thetwo states established several exchange programmes for students andteachers in order to secure the co-operation and a preservation of

minority’s culture.Generally speaking, media situation in Lithuania could be judgedaccording to the annual report by Reporters Without Borders’ index ofmedia freedoms for 2005 in which Lithuania comes twenty-first alongsideCanada. Some usual concerns for human rights of Jews and Romapopulation in Eastern and Central Europe actually do not apply toLithuania as Roma’s numbers are really insignificant while Jewishpopulation’s decline in numbers gives some weight to expressingconcerns. On the other side it is not unusual for the Jews of EasternEurope and especially those populating countries of the former SovietUnion to emigrate either to Israel or to the western world. According tothe last census of 2001, there are only 4007 Jews still living in Lithuania.

There is one issue common for most of the post-communist countries,i.e., the lustration. In Lithuania, two nationals recently brought the state tothe European Court of Human Rights for a breach of ‘Article 8 (right torespect for private life, Article 14 (prohibition of discrimination) and Article 10 (right to freedom of expression)’.45 They both worked for the

Soviet secret services KGB until 1991 and were therefore fired by theirrespective private sector employers. The Court found no violation of Article 10 (freedom of expression) but the other two breaches of therights were noted and decision was favourable for the applicants as they

45 European Court of Human Rights decision published on internet:http://www.echr.coe.int/Eng/Press/2005/April/Chamberjudgments7042005.htm visited on 22ndMay 2006


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were awarded significant damages.46 It is important to note that thisdecision sheds new light on problems in many of the post-communistcountries that even joined the European Union now but still remain

suspicious towards those citizens that served in the previous regime. It isnot unusual to find those people being stripped off some of their basichuman rights. However one should bear in mind that these cases are onindividual basis and should be considered separately.

Latvia is likely to be the most restrictive of the newcomers to theEuropean Union in the field of citizenship policy. It is reflected in theofficial language policy in Latvia. The Constitution, as well as somespecific laws adopted during the independence, provides for minorities

stating that ‘persons belonging to ethnic minorities have the right topreserve and develop their language and their ethnic and culturalidentity’.47 In practice, however, this right is often restricted as even thelanguage inspectors have been organised and sent out to check onpractices. They are not the only state body in charge of the language policyand practices which shows how great concern is among the authorities forbroadening the basis of the Latvian language and suppress widespread useof the Russian in the cities where Latvians are actually in minority. Eventhe use of minority languages in private is checked on and stateintervention is not uncommon in order to supervise compliance with thelaw.

Educational needs of the minorities are met but only according to therules that have been developed over the fifteen years of independence.One should bear in mind that present policies came on the basis of theSoviet educational model according to which most schools were Russianspeaking. During the years of gradual changes, Latvia is presently in theprocess of adopting a system according to which minorities will have theright to be educated in their own, i.e., Russian, language but only two

fifths of the tuition could be in Russian. Therefore sixty percent of thetuition is going to be in Latvian. It is hard to understand this ratio becauseif it was implemented in Kosovo under Milosevic or even in present dayMacedonia, European officials would probably have a more critical viewon the protection of minority languages.

46 European Court of Human Rights decision published on internet:http://www.echr.coe.int/Eng/Press/2005/April/Chamberjudgments7042005.htm

Visited on 22nd May 200647 Article 114. of the Latvian Constitution


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Latvia has not yet signed the European Charter on Regional and minorityLanguages. It did sign, however, several bilateral agreements with

countries whose minority members reside in Latvia. One should note thatRussia is not one of them. One should give even more weight to this factby acknowledging that most of the other minorities actually speak Russianas a mother tongue. The example of Belarusians who constitute some fourpercent of the population is telling, as 73 percent them claim Russian astheir first language.48 The importance of Russian in Latvian society isconfirmed further by the fact that another minority group, the Poles,actually do not produce any daily or weekly newspaper in Latvia.

Latvia has yet to ratify the Framework Convention for the Protection ofNational Minorities what reflects the overall atmosphere with regards tothis subject in the society. The Russians who reside mainly in urban areaspublish five daily national newspapers in Russian and there are some 30regional Russian newspapers.49 The situation in electronic media shows widespread use of Russian as the second national TV channel broadcastsup to 40 percent of its programme in Russian.50 There are also numerousprivate channels and radio stations that widely broadcast in this minoritylanguage. Most of the privately owned businesses conduct their everydayaffairs in Russian as it is noticeable from the job adverts in which Russianlanguage skills are demanded.

Thus despite the fact that in many aspects one could see some problemsin protecting or securing the rights of minorities in Latvia, the biggestminority, the Russians are evidently self-sufficient in most of the cases.One anecdotal evidence shows divisions in this society. Latvia hosted aEurovision Song Contest in 2003 and it was, like in many recentlyindependent states, a parade of kitsch and nationalism. Thus the audiencein the arena was dominantly Latvian. As the telephone voting system was

conducted, according to Latvian vote, Russian song was the best. As this was announced, almost all the audience booed the result. It was obvious

48 Euromosaic,http://ec.europa.eu/education/policies/lang/languages/langmin/euromosaic/lat1_en.html , visitedon 22nd May 200649 Euromosaic,http://ec.europa.eu/education/policies/lang/languages/langmin/euromosaic/lat3_en.html , visitedon 22nd May 200650 Euromosaic,http://ec.europa.eu/education/policies/lang/languages/langmin/euromosaic/lat3_en.html , visited

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that ethnic Latvians were present while ethnic Russians took care of thetelephone voting. This anecdotal evidence shows deep divisions in thissociety.

Estonia solved issues with its Russian minority in a much better way thanLatvia. According to the Constitution and the law, there is a possibility touse Russian in local government but permission was not granted on twooccasions when it was requested from the Narva and Sillamae councils. Inpractice, however, they conduct everyday business in Russian as majorityof the people working and living in the area are Russians. According tothe Constitution, citizens in areas with over 50 percent minorityparticipation in the local population are entitled to receive communication

from the authorities in their own language.51

The practice of the localauthorities to use Russian in everyday business in certain areas is toleratedas policing the national language is less strict than in Latvia.

Education is dominant in the only official language but it provides forminorities to choose the language of instruction. Estonian is a compulsorysubject in all schools and as a media of instruction in higher secondarylevel classes. Although this obligation might seem somewhat controversialas denying minority schools at this level of education, bylaws and laws doenable a bilingual education.

In the field of media there is a division on Estonian language and Russianlanguage media. There are two daily newspapers published in Russian andmany weekly editions. There is also a strong competition between thelocally produced papers and publications and those imported from Russiaproper which tells about the freedoms and autonomy guaranteed for theminority. One public broadcaster is broadcasting in Russian and manyprivately owned stations. This reflects market demands and evenEstonians set up Russian speaking stations in order to make business. For

the same reasons Russian is widely, although to a lesser extent than inLatvia, used in private business.

In Cyprus which is, officially, a bilingual country, the administrationlargely operates in Greek only. There is a limited amount of informationprovided in Turkish language which constitutionally is the second officiallanguage of Cyprus. The whole situation is in reality very different fromthe one described in the Constitution and State’s Laws as a logical

51 Articles 51. and 52. of the Constitution of 1992


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consequence of the Island’s division. Thus the bilingual official languagepolicy in reality means that Greek is spoken in government held areas while Turkish only is spoken in northern parts of the island. The Greek

majority provides for the minorities like Armenians, Latin and Maronitesbut not for the Turks as they are, alongside Greeks, considered to be acommunity. All minorities are obliged to opt for one of the communitiesand they have all chosen the Greek community. This rather strangesolution to nationalities policy is a consequence of colonial past and aturbulent 1970s but it is also in conflict with the Article 3. of theFramework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities.52

The reality is that Turkish, as described earlier, is discriminated against in

public administration as is in education and in judicial and stateinstitutions. The Greek speakers in the Turkish held areas are in even worse situation as there is no legal status for Greek language in this part ofthe island. There are some rights guaranteed and exercised in practice forschoolchildren to be partially educated in Turkish in governmentcontrolled territory while Turkish is the only language of instruction in the Turkish part.

Public media broadcast certain number of hours in Turkish but not

according to the ratio from 1963 Constitution according to which it wassupposed to be 70 percent in Greek and 30 percent in Turkish. There isone private radio station with equal number of hours broadcasting in eachof the languages. The rest of the private sector opted for either of thelanguages and therefore communities. There are no broadcasters in Greekin the Turkish held areas.

The recognised authorities of Cyprus have signed many internationalagreements and instruments for the protection of the status of minorities

but the practice is very much different. One should bear in mind thatthere was a specific protocol on Cyprus that was attached to the Accession Treaty in 2004. According to this protocol, in the absence ofsettlement the application of the acquis communitaire is suspended in thenorthern part of the island until the Council decided unanimouslyotherwise following the proposal from the European Commission.

52 http://ec.europa.eu/education/policies/lang/languages/langmin/euromosaic/cy_en.pdf , visited

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The whole of Slovenia has Slovenian as an official language but the areas where the official minorities live have additional official language, i.e.,Hungarian in Prekomurje and Italian in Littoral.

The education is also provided in minority languages in those areas as iscommunication with local administration and some court proceedings. There is a problem, though, of discrepancies between legal provisions andadministrative and legal practice that actually ignores possibilities toconduct their matters in Hungarian or Italian. Each of these minoritieselects a representative to the state Parliament who has the right of veto incases dealing with minority issues. This right, however, has never beenexercised.

The educational needs, though, are taken care for and even someSlovenian schoolchildren attend classes in bilingual schools that primaryshould take care of the minorities. The legal provisions are very firm inthis aspect and in place ever since 1950s. The only actual problem is adecreasing number of the members of Hungarian and Italian ethniccommunities. The reasons are to be found among natural factors like lowbirth rate, mixed marriages and assimilation rather than some kind of statesponsored ethnic purification.

The right to information in minority languages is secured by some statesponsored ventures in the field of publishing and broadcasting. TheHungarians publish weekly newspaper which is co-financed by theSlovenian government.53 Public radio and television broadcast regularprogrammes in Hungarian mainly from their regional studios in centres where Hungarians live. Thus there is more than 13 hours of radiobroadcast daily.54 The Italians are in a similar position. Educational needsare being met in the areas where most of them live by the border with

Italy. Recently, even a university in Koper has been formed, albeitSlovenian, with the possibility to study Italian. The actual use of Italian incourt and public administration is not frequent despite the legalprovisions. As the case of Hungarians showed, there is no stateinterference but the very minority members simply chose not to use it.

53 Nepujsag (People’s Paper) is published by the Institute for the Information Activity of TheHungarian National Community in Lendava, Slovenia54 http://ec.europa.eu/education/policies/lang/languages/langmin/euromosaic/slov_en.pdf , visited

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As the minority is fairly small, they are organized in close co-operation with Italians living in neighbouring Croatia and they publish two weeklynewspapers and several periodical. The broadcasting is based in the

regional capital Capodistria (Koper) as a part of the public service andthere are 18 hours of radio programme every day and nine hours oftelevision programmes in Italian on most of the days.55

Some people declare their mother tongue as Serbian, others as Croatian,some as Bosnian while a number of people put it as Serbo-Croat. Thuseven to guess actual numbers of each of these minorities according totheir native languages is impossible. What is certain, however, is that eachof these groups is far more numerous than recognized national minorities

of Hungarians and Italians. There are 35,642 Croats and 54,079 of those who declared Croatian as their mother tongue. Furthermore there are21,542 Bosniaks, 8,062 Bosnians and 10,467 Muslims and all these namescould be, but not necessarily, for the same ethnic group. Some of themmight also be Croats but also Serbs whose number is 38,964 butconfusion with actual numbers is similar to the other mutually very closeethnic groups.56

Neither of these groups is given protection like recognised autochthon

minorities of Hungarians and Italians despite outnumbering them whichever criteria is used as there are only 6,243 Hungarians and 2,258Italians.57 The education is not provided for the children in either of theselanguages, public broadcasting services are in Slovenian or recognisedminorities’ languages, newspapers are being imported from the rest ofSouth Slav states and the official communication coming from publicadministration is all in Slovenian. One could note there are many fields in which improvement is left to be desired for. The closeness of Slovenian tothe other Slavs, common recent history and economic prosperity make iteasier to bear for the Serbs, Croats and Bosnians (Bosniaks, Muslims) butit is hard to justify such distinction in status between different ethnicgroups. There are also a number of cases where the citizenship has beenrefused to some of the non-Slovene Slavs on very weak grounds and thereare many cases waiting for the European Court of Human Rights to makedecision on their applications. The numbers are not known as there is no

55 http://ec.europa.eu/education/policies/lang/languages/langmin/euromosaic/slov_en.pdf , visitedon 24th May 200656 http://ec.europa.eu/education/policies/lang/languages/langmin/euromosaic/slov4_en.html57 National Census of Slovenia 2002


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data on such cases but there is anecdotal evidence according to manynewspaper articles in various press in Serbia, Bosnia and Croatia.

Educational system in Poland allows for minority language teaching if arequired number of pupils is met. Regional public broadcasters take careof broadcasting for the minorities’ needs. Another issue of concern istown names in areas with high German or Silesian presence or theirhistorical presence. Since most of German names for the places have notbeen used for seventy years, it will be decided on a case by case basis inlocal referendums. It is not a dissimilar situation with Ukrainian speakersin eastern and southern Poland.

Malta is a unique country as it declared that no minorities existed on itsterritory after signing the Framework Convention for the Protection ofNational Minorities in 1995. The authorities also claim to have nominority languages although Malta signed European Charter for Regionaland Minority Languages in 1992. The reasons for such declarations are a very homogenous population, 98 percent of which speaks Maltese as theirfirst language.58 With such a situation in mind, one could only search forsome possible problems with linguistic, educational or cultural policies.Even checking the decisions and cases brought to the European Court of

Human Rights show some incidental cases that have very little to do withusual human rights concerns elsewhere in Europe.

Thus there is a case of Zarb Adami v. Malta (application no. 17209/02) atthis Court. The applicant is a pharmacist who refused to serve as a juror ina local Maltese court by claiming ‘that he has been the victim ofdiscrimination on the ground of sex, as the percentage of womenrequested to undertake jury service in Malta is negligible, and that he hasbeen obliged to face criminal proceedings in relation to the imposition ofa discriminatory civic obligation. He relies on Article 14 (prohibition ofdiscrimination) of the European Convention on Human Rights taken inconjunction with Articles 4 § 3 (prohibition of slavery and forced labour)of the Convention.’59

58 http://ec.europa.eu/education/policies/lang/languages/langmin/euromosaic/mal_en.pdf , visitedon 22nd May 200659 European Court of Human Rights, Zarb Adami v. Malta (application no. 17209/02), published on

internet: http://www.echr.coe.int/Eng/Press/2005/May/HearingZarbAdamivMalta240505.htm


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Thus a relative boredom with regards to human rights violations isoccasionally stirred by unusual claims brought before the Europeaninstitutions. The small country with no minorities, largely bilingual as most

of the population speaks English as well as Maltese and a relativelyprosper islands should be taken aside of the group of new EuropeanUnion members as the history, geographic position and the state ofhuman rights are very different to the rest.


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UDC 061.1:341.231.14 (497.6)HRCC 43:47:22

Ottawa CSHRD EUR X/EUINT V.700

EUR/Bosnia and Herzegovina

Bosnia and Herzegovina andEuro-integrations:

The Case of “Significant Progress”on Human Rights Front

By Miroslav ŽivanovićHuman Rights Centre of the University of Sarajevo

Abstract The article is concerned with the finding that Bosnia and Herzegovina (B-H) ismaking its way toward membership in the European Union (EU) which is not

followed by adequate progress in the area of protection and promotion of humanrights as defined by international and European human rights standards. According to EU institutions, in the period between 2003 and the end of 2005 B-H made a significant progress in the process of Euro-integrations, which resultedin the opening of negotiations for Stabilisation and Association Agreement (SAA)on November 25, 2005.

The ambition of the paper was to present a more detailed analysis of that“significant progress” by investigating in particular the state of human rights in B-H. As regards the human rights in B-H, the conclusion of the paper is that there

is no evidence of significant progress proclaimed by EU and domestic authorities.It is only possible to speak about purely formal developments, in terms ofintroducing new legislation, transfer or responsibility or transformation ofinstitutions, but the hard fact is that B-H is still a stage of mass human rights

violations. At the same time, domestic civil society is too weak and not capable toinitiate and influence any significant social changes needed in this regard.

Therefore, it is absolutely necessary that the EU adopts a more realistic approach when evaluating B-H progress in the area of human rights, which are, supposedly,the principal European value.


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Keywords: European Union; Bosnia and Herzegovina; human rights; humanrights, protection of; regional integrations

Introduction Accession into the European Union (EU) is a strategic priority for Bosniaand Herzegovina (B-H). As a matter of fact, majority of domestic andinternational officials, members of governmental and non-governmentalorganizations and representatives of a various international agenciesrecognize the European integrations as only integrative element forethnically, and very much socially, divided B-H society. One can say thatonly the idea of integration of B-H into the EU has overall support of allgovernmental authorities on all administrative levels, within all

parliamentary parties, and general public support as well60.

But, is this really true? The paper will try to answer this question byanalysing the state of human rights in B-H. If B-H officials are committedto the B-H membership in the EU, than country’s human rights recordmust be positive. If Euro-integrations are strategic priority of B-H, than,according to the experience which is coming from previous Europeanenlargement processes, partnership between government and civil societyis needed in order to achieve this historical goal. However, it seems that

neither of these is happening in B-H. On the contrary, after eleven yearslong post-Dayton period B-H is still a stage of mass human rights violations committed against B-H citizens. At the same time, weak anddivided civil society is marginalized and without any real impact on socialdevelopments.

But, relevant European institutions are accepting that B-H is making asignificant progress in terms of compliance with the EU conditions formembership. The idea of this paper is to reveal the actual content of the“significant progress” by focusing on the issue of human rights in B-H.

Bosnia and Herzegovina and European integrations

In the recent history, the first most important date in the relationsbetween EU and B-H was April 1992 when B-H declared itsindependence followed by the armed conflicts and aggression of itsneighbours (Serbia and Montenegro, at that time Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, and Croatia). The period 1992 – 1995 was a period of

60 Public Information Programme on European Integration Process (Sarajevo: Directorate for European

Integration, 2006), p. 12.


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humanitarian intervention conducted jointly by the United Nations (UN)and EU.

The war in B-H ended with the Dayton Peace Agreement (DPA) signedon November 1995. The Annex 4 of the DPA contained the Constitutionof B-H, a supreme legal act which established new European state –Bosnia and Herzegovina. The new state, its structure and division ofpowers, was a result of hardly negotiated compromise between parties inconflict. As such, it was rather fragile and unusual construction, describedeven as “political Frankenstein”61.

The Dayton Peace Agreement (DPA) is a masterful diplomatic

creation precisely because of its imprecision, allowing all sides,including the international community, to claim some kind of victory.However, the document’s fundamental contradictions declaring aunified State of Bosnia – Herzegovina while recognizing twoantagonistic Entities as constituent parts of the country; proclaimingdemocracy while entrenching ethnically based institutional structuresand political parties; reaffirming individual rights while legitimizingethnic majoritarianism have raised from the outset serious concernsabout which vision of political process in B-H would prevail. As aresult, two different interpretations of the Dayton Peace Agreementstill compete on the ground. One maintains a “positive” approach,trying to make use of DPA provisions as a foundation towards theultimate goal of re-establishing Bosnia – Herzegovina as a single State(internally modified as laid down in the Constitution) and facilitatingthe work of common institutions, implementation of internationalstandards of human rights and civil society development. The“negative” option also evokes the DPA in its argument for a furtherpartition of the country along ethni

Documents

Yearbook of the BHRN 2006