MINELRES: Romania: Ethnic diversity breifs, No.23

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Original sender: Mediafax <divers@mediafax.ro>


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No. 22 / September 9, 2002

DIVERS
- reporting ethnic diversity -

SUMMARY
1. NO AGREEMENT ON CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENTS
2. HUNGARY CONSIDERS CHANGING THE STATUS LAW BY THE YEAR END
3. ETHNIC MAGYARS IN ROMANIA NOT SO EAGER IN GETTING MAGYAR CERTIFICATE
4. FIRST ROMANIAN SCHOOL IN UKRAINE BUILD UP WITH HELP FROM BUCHAREST
5. HEALTH MEDIATOR FOR ROMA COMMUNITIES
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NO AGREEMENT ON CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENTS
BUCHAREST - Leaders of the ruling Social Democracy Party (PSD) and of
the Hungarian Democratic Federation of Romania (UDMR) last week failed
to reach an agreement on amending the Constitution. UDMR is insisting to
firstly amend the Article 148, who prohibits amending several
constitutional stipulations. If this achieved, UDMR wants to eliminate
constitution's Article 1, which defines Romania as a "national state".
Hungarian party is also proposing amending the constitution in order to
achieve several improvements of national minority rights, such as the
right to use native languages in courts. In response, PSD officials said
that the UDMR constitutional amendment proposals can be brought up for
further discussion in the parliamentary commission that debates
amendments. They added that differences on amending the constitution
should not be linked to the PSD-UDMR accord on support by the UDMR of
the PSD minority government in the parliament. 
(DIVERS)

HUNGARY CONSIDERS CHANGING THE STATUS LAW BY THE YEAR END
BUCHAREST - Hungarian Parliament intends to change the Law on Hungarians
living in neighboring countries (the so called Status Law) and to enact
by the year end a text observing the European norms, stated on Wednesday
September 4 the Hungarian Minister for Foreign Affairs, Laszlo Kovacs,
paying an official visit in Romania. Kovacs pointed out that the new
variant of the Status Law will consist of provisions related to the
observance of rights and cultural - religious identity of the Magyar
minorities, but will also encompass the recommendations made by the
Romanian government upon this document. On the other hand, Bucharest
officials expressed their hopes that the forthcoming local elections in
Hungary will create conditions for "authentic self-governance" by the
Romanian minority in that country. Laszlo Kovacs said the Hungarian
government regards it as "unacceptable" that people (especially members
of the Romany minority in Hungary) declare their identity as Romanian in
order to benefit from local autonomy funds, calling this
"ethno-business." 
(DIVERS)

ETHNIC MAGYARS IN ROMANIA NOT SO EAGER IN GETTING MAGYAR CERTIFICATE
BUCHAREST - Seven months after The Hungarian law granting economic,
cultural, and education benefits to ethnic Hungarians living abroad has
been in force, the number of ethnic Hungarians applying for benefits
granted by the Status Law is relatively low.
According to the chairman of the Central Information Bureau, Szegai
Istvan, by the time of August 25 there were applied 273,000 requests for
Hungarian IDs. The figure is rather small considering that, according to
the official data, there are almost 1,5 million ethnic Magyars in
Romania able to be beneficial of rights conferred by the Status Law. The
law caused friction between Hungary and some of its neighbors, mainly
Romania and Slovakia. Hungary last year signed a memorandum with Romania
on how to implement the law. 
(DIVERS)

FIRST ROMANIAN SCHOOL IN UKRAINE BUILD UP WITH HELP FROM BUCHAREST
CRASNA - Ukrainian and Romanian officials on Sunday, September 1,
attended in Crasna locality, Cernauti region (Ukraine), the inauguration
of the first school built abroad with the support of the Romanian
Government. The Romanian state secretary Vasile Doru Ionescu stated this
school stands for a good example in terms of Romanian-Ukrainian
collaboration. Ionescu also pointed out that, besides the amounts
already invested, which was not revealed, the Romanian Government will
send also a library and IT lab to ethnic kins in Ukraine. (DIVERS)

HEALTH MEDIATOR FOR ROMA COMMUNITIES
BUCHAREST - Over 160 persons of Roma ethnicity will be employed by the
Romanian Health Ministry in order to persuade local communities across
country to take care of their own health and to pay their duties to
health insurance system. The establishment of such health mediators
institution occurs for the first time in Europe, according to the Health
Minister, Daniel Bartos. The decision is also in accordance with the
Government strategy on improving Roma condition. "The health mediator is
the community representative who is assigned to ease leading
communication with the health bodies, to provide the information related
to health system activity, but chiefly to mark out the significance of
the measures preventing disease", the Minster Daniela Bartos explained.
Starting next month a number of 166 mediators will operate nationally in
34 counties of Romania.
(DIVERS)



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