Ukraine: country report on HR practices for 1998 (excerpts)

Reply-To: [email protected]
Sender: [email protected]
From: MINELRES moderator <[email protected]>
Date: Thu, 8 Apr 1999 20:15:32 +0300 (EET DST)
Message-Id: <[email protected]>
Subject: Ukraine: country report on HR practices for 1998  (excerpts)

From: MINELRES moderator <[email protected]>

Original sender: Larysa Denisenko <[email protected]>

Ukraine: country report on HR practices for 1998  (excerpts)


UKRAINE
 
EXCERPTS FROM THE UKRAINIAN COUNTRY REPORT ON HUMAN RIGHTS PRACTICES
FOR 1998
 
(Released by the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor,
February 26, 1999)
 
Religious Minorities
 
Anti-Semitism exists on an individual and societal basis. Some
ultranationalists groups and newspapers continued to publish and
distribute anti-Semitic tracts regularly. Public officials did not
take adequate steps to condemn anti-Semitic statements and have not
enforced the Criminal Code prohibitions against inciting interethnic
hatred. Anti-Semitic stereotypes are widespread among the general
population. Anti-Semitic  incidents, such as an October cemetery
desecration in Chernivtsi by ultranationalist groups, continue to
occur but, according to Local Jewish organisations, declined in number
and were concentrated in western regions of  the country.
 
In July the Cabinet of Ministers issued an ordinance prohibiting
construction and privatization on previous and current Jewish
cemeteries. However, some construction was reported at the cemetery in
Lviv, destroyed by  the Nazis in World War II and now the site of the
city's central market. The cemetery in Berdychiv was returned to the
Jewish community early in the year, and restoration has begun.
 
There were no arrests made in the 1997 firebombing of the Kharkiv
Israeli cultural center, nor have there been any prosecutions for
desecrating Jewish cemeteries in 1997. Jewish groups maintained that
they continued to face obstacles in reacquiring community properties
confiscated during the Soviet period. The small Reform  Jewish
community reported that it was subject to pressure and discrimination
from the dominant Orthodox Jewish organizations.
 
Evangelical Christian missionaries reported some instances of societal
discrimination against members of their churches, such as salary cuts,
layoffs, and public criticism for betraying "native religions".
 
National/Racial/Ethnic Minorities
 
Frequent harassment of racial minorities is a problem. Police
officials routinely detain dark-skinned persons for arbitrary document
checks. In addition there were increased reports of racially motivated
violence against persons of African and Asian heritage.
Representatives of these groups claimed that police officials
routinely ignored, and sometimes abetted, violence against them.
 
Roma face considerable societal discrimination. Opinion polls have
shown that among all ethnic groups, the  level of intolerance is
highest towards Roma. In the Transcarpathian region in particular,
Roma have been   subject to violence and abuse by police.
 
The Constitution provides for "the free development, use and
protection of the Russian language and other minority language in
Ukraine". This compromise builds on a 1991 Law on National Minorities,
which played an instrumental role in preventing ethnic strife by
allowing individual citizens to use their respective national
languages in conducting personal business and by allowing minorities
groups to establish their own schools. Nonetheless, some pro-Russian
organizations in eastern Ukraine complained about the increased use of
Ukrainian in schools and in the media. They claim that their children
are disadvantaged when taking academic entrance examinations, since
all applicants are required to take a Ukrainian language test. Some
regional councils attempted unsuccessfully in 1997 to give the Russian
language official status alongside Ukrainian.
 
In Crimea Ukrainian and Crimean Tatar minorities credibly complain of
discrimination by the Russian majority and demand that Ukrainian and
Tatar languages be given equal treatment to Russian. While the Crimean
government, pleasing in sufficient funds, did not assent to requests
from the Crimean Tatar community for  assistance in reestablishing its
cultural heritage through Tatar language publications and educational
institutions, the central government is working with the UNHCR, the
OSCE, and the International Organization for Migration on support for
the Crimean Tatar community.

-- 
==============================================================
MINELRES - a forum for discussion on minorities in Central&Eastern
Europe

Submissions: [email protected]  
Subscription/inquiries: [email protected] 
List archive: http://www.riga.lv/minelres/archive.htm
==============================================================