Romania resuscitates polemics with Ukraine

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Date: Mon, 14 Sep 1998 14:18:41 +0300 (EET DST)
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Subject: Romania resuscitates polemics with Ukraine

From: MINELRES moderator <[email protected]>

Original sender: Felix Corley <[email protected]>

Romania resuscitates polemics with Ukraine


Jamestown Foundation
 
Thursday, September 10, 1998
MONITOR -- A DAILY BRIEFING ON THE POST-SOVIET STATES
 
ROMANIA RESUSCITATES POLEMICS WITH UKRAINE OVER ETHNIC MINORITY.

Ukraine's Foreign Ministry on September 8 issued a statement of
concern over recent accusations by Romanian government officials and
parliamentary deputies that Ukraine "discriminates" against its
Romanian minority and "restricts" Romanian-language education. The
Foreign Ministry described the charges as "completely unfounded" and
expressed surprise over "senior Romanian Foreign Ministry officials'
joining in anti-Ukrainian propaganda." Kyiv's statement pointed out
that no change has occurred in Ukraine's policy toward the
Romanian/Moldovan minority; and that the latter enjoys substantially
more facilities, compared to the Ukrainian minority in Romania. The
statement urged Bucharest to appoint its representatives to the joint
Ukrainian-Romanian commission on ethnic minority issues, a body
envisaged in the 1997 bilateral treaty.
 
Almost 500,000 Moldovans and Romanians live in Ukraine's Chernovtsy
and Odessa regions, which coincide roughly with northern Bukovina and
southern Bessarabia, respectively. Large sections of Romania's body
politic consider those two areas as Romanian territory. President Emil
Constantinescu's pro-Western government decided to recognize the
existing border as permanent in the 1997 treaty with Ukraine, partly
in order to place Romania on the fast track of admission to NATO. With
that hope recently dashed, Romanian political circles and even parts
of the government seem to revert to previous attitudes on the subject.
Kyiv's response is somewhat belated, reflecting a wish to avoid public
controversy.
 
In Chisinau, some pro-Romanian circles are seeking, currently without
success to involve Moldova on the side of Romania in this issue.
Presidents Constantinescu, Leonid Kuchma and Petru Lucinschi took the
opportunity to discuss the situation during the TRACECA conference in
Baku on September 7-8. They decided to hold a tripartite meeting next
month and discuss cooperation among their countries. All three
presidents are interested in defusing the ethnic minority issue. Only
Constantinescu faces a difficult task in this respect. 
(DINAU, Flux, Basapress, September 8 and 9)
 
Copyright (c) Jamestown Foundation

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