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Diplomacy applied to help salve the wounds of petty politics |
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Written by Robert Hodgson
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Monday, 21 September 2009 |
The OSCE’s High Commissioner on Ethnic Minorities visited Budapest and Bratislava last week in a continuing effort to settle a row between Hungary and Slovakia over the latter’s law on the use of languages, which many in the Hungarian minority feel is discriminatory. Knut Vollebaek told senior officials in both countries that the Slovak law was “not necessarily against European norms”, but was ambiguously worded, and needed firm guidelines over its implementation in order to avoid discrimination on the basis of ethnicity.
The 63-year-old Norwegian diplomat has found himself at the centre of the dispute between the two neighbouring EU states after a meeting between Hungarian Prime Minister Gordon Bajnai and his Slovak counterpart Robert Fico on 10 September. The two premiers issued a joint government statement in which the two countries agreed on various measures aimed at improving bilateral relations and those between ethnic Hungarians living in Slovakia and Slovaks.
Slovak State Language Act
Despite this rapprochement, Fico refused to heed calls from many in Hungary, and ethnic Hungarian politicians at home, that recent amendments to the Slovak State Language Act be repealed. Aspects of the law, such as the provision that only Slovak can be used in official documentation in localities where the ethnic minority is less than 20 per cent of the population, have angered many of Slovakia’s half a million Hungarian-speaking citizens. However, Fico did agree to abide by any recommendations that the OSCE – invited by both sides as a mediator – should make on the practical implementation of the law.
The talk of mediation
“As the OSCE’s commissioner on minority affairs, it is my duty to monitor minority rights, but also to help minorities to integrate into society in the country in which they live,” Vollebaek said in Budapest last Tuesday. While in town, he attended a closed meeting of the House Foreign Affairs Committee and held talks with Prime Minister Gordon Bajnai and Foreign Minister Péter Balázs.
Bajnai said after meeting Vollebaek that he was reassured that the Slovak legislation will not be used to punish people unjustly for using their native tongue. The head of the Foreign Affairs Committee, centre-right opposition Fidesz politician Zsolt Németh thanked Vollebaek for standing up for ethnic Hungarians and mediating between Hungary and Slovakia.
Vollebaek expressed concern over the lack of clarity and ambiguity in some parts of the Slovak legislation. “There is no doubt that certain paragraphs in the legislation are unclear and can be interpreted in several ways, so it is essential to work out careful guidelines on how it is applied,” Vollebaek said. He continued on this tack in Bratislava the following day, saying the lack of precision in the legislation calls for a set of unambiguously phrased instructions on its application.
The OSCE Commissioner made 15 recommendations, which Slovak officials declined to make public. Slovak foreign minister Miroslav Lajcák said that the Slovak-Hungarian joint committee for minorities will discuss the amended Slovak language law on 25 September. Vollebaek met the Hungarian Coalition Party (MKP) chairman Pál Csáky on the evening of his visit. Over 10,000 attended a protest against the language law at the beginning of the month organised by the MKP.
Diplomatic blunder
Hungarian Foreign Minister Péter Balázs appeared to have scotched the Hungarian government's efforts at bridge building last Thursday when comments he made during an interview for the German daily Süddeutscher Zeitung prompted the Slovak foreign minister to summon the Hungarian ambassador to Slovakia Antal Heizer.
Slovakia’s Foreign Affairs Ministry summoned Heizer and conveyed “Slovakia’s resentment and Slovak Foreign Affairs Minister Miroslav Lajcak’s personal disappointment” over statements Balázs made to a German newspaper.
Big Brother
In an interview with the daily Suddeutsche Zeitung, Balázs likened Slovakia to a younger brother that Hungary must tutor in “European manners”. He also made unflattering comparisons between Slovakia and the merciless regime in Romania under its last dictator, Nikolai Ceaucescu.
These comments, needless to say, were deemed “unacceptable” by the Slovak Foreign Office.
Balázs and his Slovak counterpart will have the opportunity to make up on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York. this week. "We want to demonstrate a marked advance towards meeting this joint declaration of the prime ministers within two months," said Lajcak, speaking of the 11-point joint declaration signed by Bajnai and Fico during their meeting on 10 September.
Diplomatic relations have worsened progressively since the far right Slovak National Party joined the governing coalition in 2006. The nadir came on 21 August, when Slovakia forbade Hungarian President László Sólyom from entering the country to attend the unveiling of a statue of the Hungarian king Saint Stephen.
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