U.S. English Foundation Research
UKRAINE
Language Research
7. International treaties: Did the country ratify any international treaty dealing with the protection of minorities?
European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages signed on May 2, 1996.
Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities signed on September 15, 1995, ratified on January 26, 1998 and enacted on May 1, 1998.
Updated (June 2003)
UKRAINIAN PARLIAMENT FINALLY RATIFIED THE EUROPEAN CHARTER FOR REGIONAL OR MINORITY LANGUAGES
On May 15, 2003, the Ukrainian Parliament (Verkhovna Rada) ratified the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. The Charter was ratified seven years after being signed (on May 2, 1996) despite the promises of Ukraine to ratify it within 12 months.
In fact, the Ukrainian Parliament had ratified the Charter in December 1999, but the Constitutional Court ruled its provisions are unconstitutional, as it considered that state officials were to use only Ukrainian.
One of the reasons for the delay in the ratification is apparently fear of Ukrainian speakers that the Charter would primarily promote Russian (the major minority language in Ukraine) or that the linguistic rights of Ukrainophones living in eastern Ukraine and Crimea would be ignored. A group of prominent lawmakers appealed to President Kutchma to veto the ratification because, in their opinion, it is aimed against the Ukrainian language and protects languages that do not need any protection, namely Russian, Hungarian and Bulgarian.
The Charter will apply to the languages of the following national minorities: Russians, Belorussians, Bulgarians, Crimean Tatars, Gagauz, Germans, Greeks, Hungarians, Jews, Moldovans, Poles, Romanians, and Slovaks.
Source: Mercator News, June 2003, http://www.ciemen.org/mercator/index-gb.htm
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