Bucharest supports the ethnic Romanians in Ukraine
Bucharest responds with concrete measures to the provisions of Ukraines new education law, which drastically restricts the right to education in Romanian for this large ethnic community in the neighbouring country.
Bogdan Matei, 23.11.2017, 13:49
Direct support measures for the ethnic Romanians living in Ukraine were agreed in Wednesday’s Government meeting, at the proposal of the Ministry for the Romanian diaspora. The new regulations consolidate the framework in which they can benefit from educational support from Romania, by financing scholarships for those who study in the Romanian education system in Ukraine, by increasing the number of scholarships in the education system in Romania, and by organising, jointly with the Romanian Education Ministry, professional training sessions for the teachers in the Romanian teaching schools in Ukraine. The number of beneficiaries, the amount of the grants and the selection procedures are to be set at a later date, following consultations with the Romanian associations in Ukraine, and approved under a special Government resolution.
According to a governmental news release, in order to promote and protect the right to study in Romanian, the Ministry for the Romanian diaspora will carry on its dialogue with the Ukrainian authorities and the ethnic Romanians in Ukraine, among others by means of a consultation mechanism that will include central and local authorities, Romanian associations in Ukraine, teacher and student representatives. According to the news release, “the dialogue with the Ukrainian side continues, in the hope that through dialogue and joint efforts, the two countries will manage to find solutions to ensure that the ethnic Romanians’ rights to linguistic identity are respected in that country.”
This is only the most recent example of Bucharest’s efforts to mitigate the effects of Ukraine’s new education law, which drastically restricts the access to mother tongue education for many ethnic communities. Under the law, ethnic minority children will only be allowed to study in their mother tongue in kindergarten and primary school, and then study in Ukrainian exclusively. Previously, the foreign minister Teodor Melescanu and his Bulgarian, Hungarian and Greek counterparts signed a joint letter expressing their concern with and regret for the endorsement of the new legislation. The Romanian Education Minister Liviu Pop travelled to Kiev to lobby against it. The Parliament of Romania unanimously passed a declaration calling for a revision of the law and saying it was monitoring its provisions “with concern and the utmost attention.”
In turn, president Klaus Iohannis decided to postpone indefinitely a visit to Kiev originally scheduled for last month. Analysts view Bucharest’s concerns as absolutely legitimate, given that nearly half a million ethnic Romanians live in the neighbouring country, mostly in the eastern Romanian territories annexed by the former Soviet Union in 1940, under an ultimatum, and taken over by Ukraine as a successor state in 1991.
