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CIVIL SPECTATOR
Issue Jan - March 2011
in Slovakia
The Sme daily reported that Slovakia will officially apologise to Hedviga Malinov-kov, an ethnicHungarian Slovak who five years ago reported to the police that she was assaulted on her way to an exam at her university in Nitra and said it might have occurred because she was heard speaking Hungarian. Sme reported that the cabinet of Prime Minister Iveta Radiov agreed on September 28 to prepare an apology to her. She had taken her claim of violation of her human rights to the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) in Strasbourg on the basis of what she called errors during the investigation, Sme wrote. Before opening its hearing the ECHR asked the parties whether there was the possibility of reaching a settlement which they apparently subsequently agreed on. A document that will be submitted to the court has been signed by Malinovs lawyer, Roman Kvasnica, and Justice Minister Lucia itansk, Sme wrote. The state made no comments about a possible agreement which should eventually result in Malinov withdrawing her complaint from the court as well as dropping her claims for financial damages. Kvasnica told Sme that he will be satisfied only after the criminal prosecution against Malinov is stopped and the General Prosecutors Office undergoes a massive clean-up. Slovak society has been divided over what happened to Malinov-kov. The police claim their investigation into the case involved over 250 officers and interviews with 600 people and led
them to conclude that an assault never occurred. The j Sz Hungarian-language daily published in Slovakia reported that of all the cabinet ministers, only Interior Minister Daniel Lipic did not vote to approve the preparation of the document on an outof-court settlement. (29 Sept 2011, Sme, SlovakSpectator, j Sz,)
charges have never been laid before a court and after more than four years the case remains pending with the General Prosecutors Office. Malinovs lawyer, Roman Kvasnica, said on August 24, 2011 that he thinks that nobody will ever properly investigate who attacked his client. The state of the affair clearly shows that since 2006, when the attack on Hedviga Malinov happened, the Slovak state bodies have absolutely failed, he said, as quoted by the TASR newswire. Kvasnica recently filed an action against several prosecutors, including former general prosecutor Dobroslav Trnka and his subordinates, claiming that they have been biased in their handling of the Malinov case. He stated that there are close ties among the prosecutors that jeopardise the prosecution of those responsible. He further claimed that Trnka is not independent from political influence, the Sme daily reported. Interior Minister Daniel Lipic also recently conceded that it is unlikely that the public will learn the truth about what happened to Malinov. The problem is that from the beginning it was politicised and then it gets hard to look for the truth, especially after some time has passed, Lipic said, as quoted by TASR, adding that it is up to the General Prosecutors Office to now close the case, as it has promised to do several times.
Meanwhile, the fifth anniversary coincided with the August 26 publication by WikiLeaks of diplomatic cables from the US Embassy in Bratislava to Washington regarding the case. The alleged skinhead attack on an ethnic-Hungarian university student in Nitra in August might have happened after all, the embassy wrote in a cable on October 6, 2006, nearly a month after Malinov was accused of lying. The embassy referred to a contact with ties to the Ministry of the Interior as the source of its information. The Slovak society has been divided over what happened young woman may have received a light beating but to Hedviga Malinov since she reported to police that then tried to make her injuries appear worse than they she had been attacked and suggested it might have actually were because she believed that a few punches been because she was heard speaking Hungarian. The were not enough to make her case to the police, the police say their investigation into the case involved Embassy wrote, giving the explanation it said it had over 250 officers and interviews with 600 people, and received from the source. led them to conclude that an assault never occurred. (5 Sept 2011, SME, TASR, SlovakSpectator) The police findings were released on September 12, 2006, at a press conference by then interior minister Robert Kalik and then prime minister Robert Fico, with Kalik stating it is beyond doubt that the case did not happen. He presented several pieces of alleged evidence, including DNA samples, to support his assertion. Malinov, who has since married and is called kov, was then charged in May 2007 with perjury and making false claims. However, the
CoE-Commissioner has visited Slovakia and met the ethnic Hungarian civil activists too
During his stay Thomas Hammarberg, Council of Europes Commissioner for Human Rights and Mikulas Dzurinda, Minister of Foreign Affairs negotiated about the question of dual-citizenship and minority rights - informed press office of Foreign Affairs Ministry. Rudolf Chmel, Vice-Prime Minister for Human Rights and National Minorities also met the commissioner, and informed him about the rights of Roma and other minorities living in Slovakia. Furthermore, the Commissioner met Lucia Nicholson, State Secretary of the Ministry of Social Affairs and ombudsman Pavol Kandrac. The commissioner initiated an appointment with the largest ethnic Hungarian civic umbrella organization, the Round Table of the Hungarians in Slovakia (RTHS). Hammarberg made inquiries about the problems arising from the minority language use. RTHS-representatives Laszlo Ollos, spokesperson of organization and Attila Lancz lawyer of the RHTSs legal service, informed the commissioner about the recent amendments in the state language act and the act on the minority language use, and also the expectations and positions of the ethnic Hungarian civil sphere. They stressed the fact, that the recommendations of the Venice Commission (CoE) on the state language act (published in mid October 2010) has remained practically fully ignored by the Slovak state authorities. The civil activists also recalled certain parts of the governments manifesto that made a commitment to amend the state language act with regard to the 2006 status quo in the field of the minority rights and consisently fulfil Slovakias international commitments. As for the act on the minority language use, the civil activists have outlined the positive steps made in this regard, but also underlined, that the amendments have not improved the minority language use in merit, as the legal guarantees of the law enforcement remained very poor. Finally, the representatives of the RTHS have delivered information on the actual turbulences around the dual citizenship, and also outlined the current and former legal practice of Hungary and Slovakia in this field. (27 Sept 2011, Minority Report)
However businesses were not nuts about the action, Hungarian politicians reacted. Indeed, based on the first sign, they were surprised by the civil initiations, but afterwards they started a campaign taking They are anonymous and claim for bilingualism. advantage of sticker-mood. More active groups act irrespectively from each other. The Hungarian Coalition Party has placed billboards First of all they targeted shops and then tried to point out at the beginning of summer and the Most party out deficiencies in language use in offices. Groups distributed orange self-made stickers supporting succeeded modestly, however they could bring the bilingualism. Based on our information, none of the issue into public sense and politicians must react. actions can be related to any party. Our initiation is Everything began with stickers. Stickers appeared on the doors and shop windows in South Slovakia in the spring claiming bilingualism where Hungarian sign was missing. Plenty of such places exist. free of any party- asserted Bilingual South Slovakia anonym organisation. However this does not exclude the possibility, that anonym actions supported by parties will rear their head in the finish of election campaign. Self-interest Some of the politicians reaction came off specially. In SMKs last update on its website about activists statement and, the road signs standing nothing alludes that it was not an action of the party. Moreover, at first sight it seemed, that was made by SMK. Based on our information, only due to the activists objection has changed the party the texts position. As we know, it was commented by SMK as a simple editorial mistake. Politicians representing Most party at times had declared about given actions to the Slovak and Hungarian press differently. To the latter have asserted from the beginning, that they understand the aim of the action and they are happy about it. I could apprehend this as sort of civil sensitiveness that calls attention to the ambiguity of bilingualisms problem- declared Rudolf Chmel Deputy Prime Minister for Minorities to JOJ channel after the issue of road sign. Bela Bugar Chairman of Most party told to Plus jeden In following weeks- as based on our information den newspaper at the beginning of August, that he irrespectively of each other- more parties started to can not support, nor condemn the action. use stickers. Afterwards, smallest part of shopkeepers put out Hungarian sign, but the great majority wanted To be continued to sue if they could. Majority of stickers could be The Bilingual South Slovakia asserts that the work removed easily, so they did not injure shopkeepers. will be continued. After the sticker-action, also We use only our stickers with our name on it (Bilingual South Slovakia). Where this kind of stickers turned up, that were us. We saw other types of stickers in the press and messages painted with paint spray, but it was not us- wrote activists of Bilingual South to our editorial staff. The politics reacts
during summer activists with announcing arrivals in Hungarian and English at railway station in Sturovo demonstrated against Railway Companys monolingual practice. In Sturovo, where 2/3 of people are Hungarian, information in Hungarian language about arrivals and departures is not announced. The organisation states, that more sympathizers joined Bilingual South Slovakia in last few months.
The action called Sturovo project has been watched by more than 10 thousand people on youtube.com website and the other action in Dunajska Streda by more than 14 thousand people. 1442 users have liked the organisations Facebook page, comparing to SMKs official page with 1335 and the Mosts 3618 A Jewish organization, the Anti-Defamation League likes. in New York awarded Jnos Esterhzy the honours for fortitude, that will be given to his daughter (j Sz, 29 Oct 2011) on Thursday on ADLs general assembly in New York. Jzsef Bernyi, the chairman of the Hungarian Coalition Party (SMK) has been invited for the ceremony where he hold a ceremonial speech on 4th Nov 2011. The ceremony in Grand Hyatt New York Hotel has been attended by Zsolt Nmeth, Hungarian Under-secretary of Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The Courage to Care Award was established by AntiDefamation League (ADL) in 1987 and is awarded yearly to people who saved the lives of Jews from A symposium focussing on the danger of assimilation Nazi persecution. The decision to confer the award and efforts to strengthen the Hungarian identity of was announced in October on the ADLs webpage and ethnic kin was held in Budapest on Friday and Saturday at the same time Countess Alice Esterhzy-Malfatti, with representatives of ethnic Hungarian organisations Esterhzys daughter living in Rome was informed. in neighbouring countries in attendance. Peter Kovacs, Janos Esterhzy deserved this award, as in 1939 he Secretary-General of the Hungarian Democratic actively participated in helping Polish people- most of Union of Romania, told MTI that efforts to strengthen whom were Jews- to flee to Hungary. Furthermore he the community should concentrate on the business was the one and only person who said no to a pogrom sphere and on guaranteeing its representation in the in the Slovak parliament. Romanian, Hungarian and European parliaments as well as the local authorities of Transylvania. Kovacs (j Sz, 4 Nov 2011) said that autonomy could only be achieved through a dialogue with the majority nation. The Hungarian government, he said, can also help if it gains strength at regional level so as to prevent such phenomena as the Slovak language law or the enforcement of the principle of collective guilt in Serbia.
Jozsef Berenyi, leader of Slovakias Party of the Hungarian Coalition, called for efforts to reverse the ongoing shrinking of the Hungarian minority. To attain this goal, ethnic Hungarians will need extra rights and change their approach to minority life, he said. Zoltan Kantor, nation policy advisor to Hungarys Ministry of Public Administration, said that the number of ethnic Hungarians keeps declining. This trend, he said, could be attributed to migration, negative population growth and mixed marriages, accounting for 17-18 percent among Transylvanian Hungarians and over 20 percent count Jnos Esterhzy in Slovakias and Serbias Hungarian communities. (MTI, 17 Oct 2011)
Ilonka Tams
old regulations (from 1994 and 1999), according to which approximately a dozen of municipalities were not allowed to display their ethnic names, in spite they fulfilled the appropriate legal conditions. SMK party demanded that the government included the point in the agenda of the last session of the year, and that it The Roundtable of Hungarians in Slovakia, the biggest pushed the change through in fast-track proceedings. civil umbrella organization evaluated its work through The government finally approved the government the year: A meaningful and productive year is behind decree containing the list of bilingual place names on us. We managed to conduct a very serious campaign 12 Dec 2011. The document has been submitted by and draw media attention to the campaign of census, Rudolf Chmel (Most-Hd), Deputy Prime Minister comment on key laws concerning minorities living of the Slovak Republic for Human Rights and in Slovakia, make new drafts and enabled the Legal National Minorities. The new list contains altogether Aid Service with legal advice to help more plaintive. 655 municipalities, in which the ratio of the ethnic The most important occasion of last year was the Hungarians, Ruthenians, Roma people, Germans census. With the campaign and other related activities and Ukrainians exceeds 20 % threshold each, thus the roundtable did its duty in favour of assuming these municipalities are entitled to use their native Hungarian nationality (ethnicity) on the sheets languages in the official communication (including The staff (co-workers) of the Legal Aid Service was their ethnic place names). active during the whole year. Young lawyers took an The new regulation does not introduce new possibilities active part in preparation of the draft law about legal compared to the old one, it only removes an unlawful stance of minorities. Therefore after a long time a practice from the past. According to this practice draft came into existence that regulated the status several municipalities with (official) Slovak names of minorities living in Slovakia in detail and gave a that had been derived from the names of significant starting point for further conciliation. Staff of Legal Slovak historical personalities (e.g. Ludovit Stur Aid service has opined the language law and the draft STUROVO), were not entitled to bear their ethnic law about minority language use. In the latter case names, in spite they fulfilled the legal condition of the they worked out their own recommendation that is 20 % threshold. This contradiction was caused by an more progressive and more European compared to administrative fault in 1994, when the appropriate the law currently in force. laws appendix missed out the place names of the aforementioned several municipalities.According to the new regulation 511 settlements are entitled to use Hungarian ethnic place name, and 68 Ruthenian, 57 Roma, 18 Ukrainian and one German place name is also the part of the list. (MTI, Minority Report, www.thedaily.sk, 18 Dec 2011)
The Roundtable deems it important that in the uncertain legal circumstances- due to the dual citizenshipeverybody can get accurate information about the consequences of acquiring Hungarian citizenship. In reference to this subject the Roundtable has issued a comprehensive prospectus The roundtable organized two extensive events last year: at one they discussed further roles and achievements of associate organizations in December and secondly the economic situation and possibilities of South- Slovakia was the topic in March. The Roundtable reckon determination of focal point is crucial, namely, economic revival is in our mutual interest. (j Sz, 30 Dec 2012)
The lower (Hungarian) plate displayed by piratecivil activist at that time illegally
Slota criticizes the Roundtable of Hungarians in Slovakias draft concerning local governments
Jan Slota, chairman of Slovak National Party is apprehensive about the Hungarian minoritys pretension to autonomy. Information about the comprehensive prospectus towards the solution of minorities situation living in Slovakia issued by the Roundtable of Hungarians in Slovakia made us Ivan Gasparovic dumbfounded. In the pursuance of recommendation minorities could decide on issues concerning them. Moreover the legislation draft figures with development of governments nationwide, regional and local governments. Specifically they laid autonomy claims on the table- asserted Slota. According to indications, the referendum will not bring success to towns initiating a change to their official (MTI, 21 Dec 2011) Slovak names. Information at Uj Szos command suggests that to change the names of Kolarovo and Tesedikovo a regulation issued by the government is needed. The determination and alteration of towns names is the governments competence. However cities and towns can ask for name alteration, but before the final decision the government takes into consideration other factors as well, says the press department of Home Affairs.
Gasparovic: the bilingual lists of place names are not in compliance with the constitution
In recent weeks it became public that together with early elections a referendum will take place in Guta and Pered: Slovak names would change to Guta and Pered from Kolarovo and Tesedikovo. If the proposals get to the government, the new cabinet, which is likely The Iveta Radicova led coalition government adopted to be led by Robert Fico, will decide. a government decree containing the place names in minorities language. The dispute over the issue has (j Sz, 4 Jan 2012) been postponed twice previously. President Gasparovic was anxious to do so third time so he delineated his objections relating the decree with Rudolf Chmel (Most-Hd), Deputy Prime Minister of the Slovak Republic for Human Rights and National Minorities. In Gasparovics opinion the decree oversteps both the law on minority language use and the article in the constitution relating the Slovak as the single official language. Independent observers say, the presidents opinion does not surprise at all, since he many times proved his anti-Hungarian feelings in the past and his political career began within Vladimir Meciars infamous nationalist movement (HZDS). (MTI, Minority Report, 4 Jan 2012)
The Hungarian CIVIL SPECTATOR in Slovakia is issued by the Forum Minority Research Institute. Address: Parkova 4, Samorin, 931 01, Slovakia, Tel.: 00421 31 590 27 90, E-mail: foruminst@foruminst.sk