INTERNATIONAl
STUDIES

 International Studies is a by-anual Journal edited by the
Center for International Studies

Abstracts

  STUdii   INTERNATIONALE

 Studii Internationale este o publicatie semestriala editata de
Centrul de Sudii Internationale

Rezumate

International Relations and Orthodoxy in Eastern and South-Eastern Europe
Gabriel Andreescu


1. Religion and security

The preoccupation for the role religion plays in international relations is surprisingly recent . That this theme started to present interest in the nineties is due to the alarming consequences of neglecting, for decades, the religious dimension of the conflicts on the globe . The illuminist prejudice which ruled out the religious life from the "normal" society and predicted that religion would play an ever more diminishing role in the modern world is thus surpassed . After the "cold war", the nature of the conflicts has changed. Most of them have resulted from "clashes of communal identity, whether on the basis of race, ethnicity, nationality, or religion" . This hypothesis was extensively publicized by means of Huntington's study about the "clash of civilisations". Huntington's vision on the tensions occurring between different cultures is complementary to a more sophisticated one, which views the conflict "not to be a clash of civilizations but rather as one between local cultures (groups as civilizations) and global civilization emerging from the 'civilizing process'" .
Beyond the theme of the threats upon the national and international security on the background of increasing vulnerabilities , the connection between security and religion stands out as a very concrete element in the processes of democratic reform from different regions of the world. These reforms are co-related at least with expansion processes of the economical, political and military structures. This kind of processes take place in Latin America, Asia, but this study refers to Europe under the impact caused by the extension of NATO and European Union.
The research on the impact religion has on international relations has to challenge at least two types of questions: 1) the extent to which religion plays a role in the internal and international dynamics; 2) what elements of the religious phenomenon do have priority in this regard. The studies on these themes are more or less convincing. From among the methodologies, I reiterate the coding of the main religious systems, by means of which it was possible to reason on the resemblance between Islamism an Marxism (viewed as a "controlling" ideology) and, at the other extreme, the classification of Buddhism and Jainism among the non-aggressive doctrines .
Finding again Marxism and Islamism at the lead of the destabilizing movements and, at the opposite end, Buddhism is also a result of other sorts of approaches. The generous impact of Buddhism was supported by multicultural studies. John Peek reasons that the democratic change that took place in Japan at the end of the war was possible because "the concepts of popular sovereignty and human rights have deep roots in Japanese culture. Specifically, … , Buddhism, as one of the 'Three Treasures of Japanese culture' is inherently antithetical to the authoritarian sociopolitical structures that have periodically been imposed on the people of Japan" . He identifies directly in the Buddhist doctrine the precursory concepts and principles of the modern political values, from the free will to rationalism and the propensity for social activism: "... in contrast to most other world religions, Buddhism emphasizes learning, non faith, and the quality of life in this world, not the next" .
Because of its aggressive expansion and involvement in international terrorism, very many studies were dedicated to Islamism, particularly to fundamentalist Islamism. The thesis that the Islamic doctrine is incompatible with the values of the liberal societies has been asserted in different ways: "in all Muslim societies, the possibility of human judgement regarding the appropriateness or cruelty of a punishment decreed by God is simply out of question." This would result from the fact that "Essentially, the Islamists are saying that the people are not sovereign. Only God's will is sovereign, which is reflected in the shari'a enunciated from the Qur'an and the Sunna of the Prophet. They believe that the majority voice can constitute the basis for legitimate exercise of political authority in a Islamic state, but only if it recognizes and remains within the parameters of the shari'a paradigm". Hence, "only those outcomes of political processes are legitimate that are sanctioned by the shari'a … . The primary value is shari'a and not democracy, and whosoever is willing to enforce the shari'a can claim Islamic legitimacy, whether he is a hereditary monarch, a military officer, a mullah, or a politician. Both the Muslim Brotherhood in Sudan and the Jamaat-i-Islami in Pakistan had the similar experience of collaborating with the military regimes in order to seek the supremacy of shari'a, abandoning their principal position of commitment to democratic means" .
Yet, there are not few Islamic authors who deny that fundamentalist Islamism would naturally result from the Islamic principles. There should be considered, first of all, that "virtually any cultural heritage is morally rich enough that it can, if appropriately constructed, under some circumstances make inspirational contributions to the struggle for human rights, democracy and social justice" . According to other authors, behind the fundamentalist Islamic discourse and, of course, behind the means used, is not the will of a majority, nor the authenticity of a religious interpretation, but the pragmatic goal of "their staying in power and denying legitimacy to the programs of opponents and critics" .
The complexity of the deliberation within Islamism demonstrates, perhaps more than any other casuistic studies, the necessity of being cautious when we voice judgements regarding the impact of the religious ideas on the international relations. Small details may affect essentially the original religious system. I could bring as an argument the Buddhism in Sri Lanka that happens to revolve around the warlike figure of the King Duttagamani ("the ferocious"), consenting to and proclaiming violence. The modern nationalistic Buddhists have invoked the tradition of the heroic warrior, with maleficent consequences for the conflict in Sri Lanka . Moreover, the compared studies within communities with similar faiths show that, although the religious systems represent a significant background, the result depends greatly on the other cultural and sociopolitical factors . Of course, in such situations, the synergies acquire an increased explanatory role.

2. Churches on the Peoples' side and churches on the Power's side.
Powerful churches, weak states

The relation between the main churches and the political power has an impact on the internal and external stability and security of the states. The involvement of the religious communities in the political game becomes an even more serious factor when between them occur confessional conflicts, such as in South-Eastern Europe. There are two interesting types of behavior as far as the confessional institutions are concerned: "churches on the Peoples' side" and "churches on the Power's side".
A good example for the first category would be the Catholic Church. In many instances it militated for social and political emancipation and had a decisive role in this regard in the third world countries. Under the authority of Cardinal Jaime Sin, the Catholic Church was the avant-garde in the fight against Marcos's regime. Between 1978-1979, the Hierarchy of the Catholic Church took the lead in the opposition against General Somoza. Because of its incapacity to overthrow him the Church resorted to the Marxist-Leninist Sandinists. (Many Sandinist leaders were priests.) Once the Sandinists have got the power, the Catholic Church has become the main criticizing force of the regime they imposed. The Catholic Church made a compromise, which had a decisive role in the loss of the elections by the Sandinists in 1990.
In El Salvador, in the seventies, the Archbishop Oscar Romero was the most respectable political figure, criticizing the militaries, as well as the Marxist guerilla, until he was shot dead. The Catholic Church tried to support the self-organisation of the peasants, which lead to the shooting of some priests.
In South Africa, the Catholic Church had a complex participation, the prominent figure being that of Archbishop Desmond Tutu. Within the African National Congress, a strong Christian orientation was the main competitor with the Marxist-Leninist ideology and the main limiting factor of the use of terrorism. Recently, the role of the Catholic leaders stood out again, in Indonesia.
There can be listed many advantages of the Catholic Church, which enabled it to play such an important stabilizing role in the world. I would like to quote in this regard the enumeration made by Johnston Douglas as regards the presence of the Catholic Church in Latin America :
"The Catholic Church's leaders and property are relatively inviolable. (…) Catholicism's international links as a movement and its connection with the Vatican in Rome make it easier to mobilize international support and more difficult for a government to dominate it. (… ) The Catholic Church's discipline is a powerful force that makes it a de facto political party. Its cadres are dedicated and often highly educated. (…) Catholicism has a distinct ideology, of which an important component is social justice, although the latter may be emphasized and deemphasized, depending on the Vatican and the local leadership. (… ) In Pope John Paul II, the Catholic Church has a strong, charismatic leader who, in spite of opposing neo-Marxist liberation theology, is a firm supporter of democracy and activism. (… ) Catholics compose the great majority of people everywhere in Latin America and form a very large bloc in several dozen countries throughout Africa and Asia" .
Noteworthy is the elaboration, within the Catholic Church, of an approach regarding the human rights and the rights of the national minorities, approach that constitutes an essentially correct answer to the risks generated by the violation thereof .
An opposite pattern of the church's cooperation with the power is offered by the collaborationism of the Orthodox Churches.
The Orthodox Churches' involvement in the life of the societies in Eastern and South-Eastern Europe is associated with another binomial relevant for the problem of the regional stability and security: strong churches versus weak states. It is as clear as possible that the states from Eastern and South-Eastern Europe are in the latter category.
A form of "weak state" is what Samuel Huntington called "praetorian state", namely a state faced with an imbalance between popular pressures for rapid political, economic and social mobilisation and unresponsive, brittle and archaic intentions which can not effectively channel, absorb and accommodate this pressure . When he elaborated this concept, Huntington had in mind the countries struck by the double impact of a strong tradition and the pressure of modernity, such as Greece.
The pattern of a "weak state" can be exceptionally found today in the life of the former communist countries. In a weak state the institutions capable of a peaceful administration of the rule of law have not been strengthened yet . The context of the new democracies makes the elite to have more importance than what is allowed to a society governed by rules and not by wills. The importance of the elite throughout the transition period makes them responsible not only for the internal situation of their countries, but also for the regional stability: "What is more, there is a risk that, without the will and involvement of the state leaderships there, inner-state structures will be exported which above all substantially damage international security if they become crossfrontier phenomena" . We have to add that the post-totalitarian elite come across the elite that served the former regimes.
Since the institutions of the Orthodox Church were a component of the control system of the communist regimes, their behavior in the setting of the new democracies depends on the status of the elite with which they collaborated under communism. When the communist regime in Bulgaria fell the Patriarch was challenged. The head of the Romanian Orthodox Church, Teoctist, withdrew himself a few months after Ceausescu' s regime fell, after which he came back with audacity in the life of the Romanian Orthodox Church, once the conservatory political group gathered around the then president Ion Iliescu took over completely the internal affairs.
Certainly, by their representing powerful majorities in certain countries, the Orthodox churches have acquired, after the changes in 1998, a totally different political relevance. The interest of miscellaneous political forces in drawing the Orthodox clergy on their side has done nothing else but to stimulate the political projects of the clergy, which projects are directed against the assets of the new democracies. The pressure of the clergy, in the sense of playing in the social life an incompatible role with that of the secular state, has started to have success in recent years.
It would be a mistake to consider the transition period from the ex-communist countries as the necessary framework for the success of an Orthodox militancy with international consequences. The exceptional position the Greek Orthodox Church has in the Greek State shows that the ancient history of the area and the status of institutions of the Orthodoxy remain decisive factors.
Thus, in all the Eastern and South-Eastern European countries with an Orthodox majority the democratic rule of law came under an unbearable pressure. This situation becomes more obvious when we compare it with the role of the Catholic Church in Poland and that of the Protestant Churches in East Germany, prior to and after the changes in 1989. The nature of a religion traditionally allied with the power and the weak character of the quasi-totality of the state in that region stand for the main risk factors.

3. The Orthodox nationalism: the Yugoslavian example

Unlike other religions, the role of the Orthodox Church is determined by its clothing with a national dimension. Although there are first-rate philosophers who contested the nationalistic temptation, such as N. A. Berdyaev, or contemporary ones, such as Olivier Clement, the main trend of the Orthodox thinking follows this line. The mixture of nationalism and religion entertains or augments serious sources of tension with other confessional and ethnical minorities. Therefore, the Orthodox churches introduce a cultural factor that poses substantial difficulties for the modern life of the state.
The most dramatic example of the effects produced by the religion-nationalism mixture (the mixture between religion and state) is Yugoslavia . The overlap of the ethnicity on the religion , typical for Bosnians, has extended even over the Croats: "Both the churches and the nationalists have labored mightily to get close to a 100 percent fit between religion and ethnic identity among Serbo-Croatian speakers and have tended to reinforce nationalism rather than any sort of 'catholic' universalism. The churches are indeed both militant and national in former Yugoslavia lands. The two identities thus reinforce each other" . Paul Mojzes brings a few arguments, many of them from his own experience, which confirm the accountability of the Catholic Church in Croatia for the strengthening of nationalism and promotion of the conditions that lead to war.
But the most shocking case of a dramatic involvement of a religion in the instigation to ethnical hatred and confrontation is still that of the Serbian Orthodox Church. It not only contributed to the outbreak of the war, but it contributed to it decisively . The Serbian Orthodox Church made extravagant public declarations regarding the Albanian "threat" in Kosovo. It practiced the grossest misinformation to counteract the critics against the brutal intervention of the Serbian army in that area. Through "The Declaration of the Bishops of the Serbian Orthodox Church Against the Genocide Inflicted by the Albanians of the Indigenous Serbian Population, Together with the Sacrilege of Their Cultural Monuments in Their own Country" of September 14, 1988, it prepared the grounds for the cancellation of the autonomy of the province by the Government from Belgrade. The Hierarchy of the Serbian Orthodox Church carried out a long campaign of reminders of the crimes committed by the Croats during the World War II and assumed that Muslims and Catholics are the irremediable enemies of the Serbians. These actions were accompanied by false reports regarding the murdering of some Serbians or the destruction of religious monuments. The Serbian Orthodox Church defined itself, in this context, as the main defender of the Serbian interests, the documents of the Holy Synod referring to "the Christian Serbian nation" and "the Serbian Church, truly indigenous and encompassing of all the people" . In the first phase, the hierarchy of the Serbian Orthodox Church supported Milosevic's regime, certain critics against him made by some Orthodox leaders dating only after 1992 . Although there were more of such distancings, the Hierarchy of the Serbian Orthodox Church remained a constant defender of many of the thesis of Milosevic's regime, such as the denial of the rapes committed by the Serbian soldiers despite the evidence presented by the International Court for former Yugoslavia. The Synod of the Serbian Orthodox Church severely condemned NATO's ultimatum of February 1994. Many priests enrolled in the ethnic militias, and shared in the massacres started by these.
Today, the Orthodox Church in Bosnia hosts Karadzic, charged of war crimes, who is hiding himself from the NATO troops . But this is only a detail in the more general process regarding the transformation of the Serbian Orthodoxism into a central factor in the projects of creation of a antidemocratic alliance in East Europe, against the western influences who welcome the aspirations of the societies from that region.

4. The cooperation of the Orthodox Churches with the communist regimes
and the changes after the fall thereof

The Russian Federation is the country with the most numerous Orthodox population in the world and the main force of a possible pan-Orthodoxism. Russia-and then the Soviet Union-constituted a pattern for the other communist regimes, as far as dealing with religion was concerned.
The relationship between the Russian Orthodox Church and the Russian State was always very close. The victory of bolshevism in Russia lead to the subjection and suppression of the religious life by the atheistic regime. However, in line with the old tradition, the religious leadership was actively used to justify the regime and its schemes. That was the context in which Patriarch Sergii had proclaimed in 1927 that the "joys and sorrows of the [communist] Motherland" were those of the Russian Church . The clergy, especially its leaders, became a component of the control apparatus of the political regime. Today this phenomenon can is well known, grace to the chance of opening the archives for a while, after the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Konstantin Kharchev, chairman of the Council for Religious Affairs (1984-1989) has confirmed that the Russian Church was rigorously controlled by the Central Committee of the Communist Party and by the KGB . Patriarchate's Department of External Ecclesiastical Relations was composed of many KGB agents . Materials unearthed from the KGB archives indicate that four of the six current permanent members of the Moscow Patriarchate Holy Synod were at least until recent years KGB agents .
The whole further evolution of the Russian Orthodox Church followed a typical course for the developments in the former communist countries: the substitution of the servile procommunist discourse with a radical nationalistic one. Aleksii II, one of the leading lights of the Brezhnevite ecclesiastical nomenklatura, (named patriarch in mid-1990-in May 1990 the former Patriarch Pimen died) followed the sergianstvo philosophy [named after Patriarch Sergii (d. 1944)]. In December 1990, he appended his signature to the "Letter of the Fifty-Three" who proposed to Gorbachev that "immediate measures be carried out to counter separatism, subversive anti-state activity, incitement and inter-ethnic discord, employing for this purpose the law and the powers granted to you" .
The disappearance of the Soviet Union allowed the Orthodox Church to be one of the most consistent forces dedicated to the salvation of the empire. In mid-1992, Patriarch Aleksii underlined the following: "The canonical territory of the Moscow Patriarchate includes not only Russia, but Ukraine, Belarus, Moldova, the countries of the Baltic, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Central Asia" .
As early as August 1993, Patriarch Alexii had given President Yeltsin a direct ultimatum: either the president signs a new law passed by the legislature restricting the activities of foreign missionaries in Russia, or "the Russian Orthodox Church would go into opposition-that is, the Red-Brown coalition" . The Russian Orthodox Church has entered de facto in this alliance aiming against the values promoted by the western democracies .
The pressure of the Orthodox Church allowed, despite the opposition of president Yeltsin, the promulgation of a conservatory law which restricts the rights of the "unrecognised" religions by setting a numerical standard and a proof of 15 years of existence as a prerequisite for registration. In turn, Russian rightists found themselves increasingly looking to the Russian Orthodox Church as an institution that might potentially play a role in propping up the unity of the Soviet State. The leftists in Russia had the same position . Mass media turned the alliances between the politicians and the Church into public events and consequently provided them with an even greater political impact .
The evolution of the Orthodox Churches in the neighbouring countries was influenced by the evolutions of the Great Neighbour and by the autocephalous nature of the institutions of the Orthodoxy. The return to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church became a hot subject at the end of the ninth decade . On June 5-6, 1990, seven Orthodox bishops, more than 200 priests, 500 laymen held a council in Kiev during which they elected Mstyslav (Skrypnyk) patriarch of the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church. After that date, Metropolitan Filaret, who had close relation with Kravchuk, the future president, took the lead of the autocephalisation process. Under the pressure of the Moscow Patriarch and with the purpose to stop the autocephalisation process, on May 27, 1992, a council of Bishops of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church selected as head of the autonomous Ukrainian Orthodox Church Metropolitan Volodymyr. Filaret tried, in turn, in June 1992, to create a new entity, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church - Kiev Patriarchate.
Similar movements appeared in Moldova. In October 1992, at the request of Metropolitan Vladimir and the Orthodox populace of Moldova, the Moscow Holy Synod decided to declare the Moldovan Eparchy an autonomous church. In this moment the Romanian Orthodox Church joined the race. The Patriarch Teoctist appointed a Bessarabian Metropolitan on Moldova soil, with Bishop Peter of Balti serving as its temporary administrator.
Orthodox Church in Latvia split in four parts. On January 31-February 1, 1990, in Belarus an extraordinary Bishops' Council in Moscow created an autonomous Belarussian Orthodox Church under Metropolitan Filaret of Minsk-a successful story.
I bring up the case of Bulgaria, whose communist regime was, perhaps, the most attached one to the leaders in Moscow. At the beginning of their regime, the communists initiated an intensive secularisation of Bulgarian society, starting with the Orthodox population (85% of the 6,8 million in 1994). At the same time, the 1.2 million Muslims were forced either to assimilate and abandon their faith or emigrate . The process of secularisation was simplified by the weak resistance of the leaders of the Orthodox Church in Bulgaria, "who were historically conditioned to obey infidel and despotic matters" . The analysts consider that the most visible evidence of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church's cooperation with the regime was its participation to the falsifying propaganda regarding the religious freedom in Bulgaria. A shameful act in this regard is the denunciation in 1989 by the Orthodox Church of Fr. Hristofor Sabaev's "Committee for Religious Rights, Freedom of Conscience and Spiritual Values" . The involvement of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church in the nationalistic propaganda was also accomplished through the regime's claims to Macedonia against Yugoslavia and fortified them with religious justification. That was the context that led, as I mentioned before, to the challenge of the Patriarch of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church after the revolution. The same reason explains probably the weaker power of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church to oppose the religious liberalisation. The most obvious evidence of the bettering of the religious freedom in Bulgaria was that, on October 7, 1998, the Council of Ministers in Bulgaria granted legal recognition to the Christian Association of Jehovah's Witnesses, according to Article 6 of the Law on Religions .

5. The Romanian Orthodox Church and the pressure on the secular rule of law

5.1 The cooperation with the communist regime

The Hierarchy of the Romanian Orthodox Church cooperated closely with the communist regime. The first Patriarch who took the lead of the Romanian Orthodox Church under communism, owed his ascension to the fact that, in 1944, he hid GheorgheGheorghiu-Dej, the future Prime Secretary of the Romanian Labor Party, in his parochial house, in order to save him from his being arrested.
The Romanian Orthodox Church was directly involved in the attempt to destroy the Greek Catholic Church . In 1948, it took a part of the latter's patrimony and shared in the conversion by threat of the Greek Catholics . The Orthodox theologians, including the most reputable one, considered the policy of the communist regime toward the Greek Catholic Church as an opportunity for the Romanian Orthodox Church to win its supremacy. It considered that "we are not wise unless we take advantage of this opportunity" .
On different occasions the Hierarchy of the Romanian Orthodox Church declared its support for the communist regime. All the patriarchs made public declarations in favour of the communist regime and its leaders. They welcomed the putsch of the communists and the expulsion of King Michael out of the country: "The last pillar of Caesarism, popery and imperialism in these places, the last Hohenzollern has abdicated" . Justinian Marina , Justin Moisescu , Teoctist Arapas directed their policy in a way that was followed by the other hierarchs of the Romanian Orthodox Church. The publications of the Romanian Orthodox Church used the style of the propagandistic means of the regime.
Noteworthy is the fact that, although in the Romanian press there have been published a lot of information regarding the link between members of the Parliament, government officials, mass media people and the former Security, only very little information on the cooperation of the leaders of the Romanian Orthodox Church or of the former Ministry of Cults with the political police became the object of public scandals. This does not indicate the lack of cooperation, but the importance that is attributed today to the Romanian Orthodox Church by the former structures involved in the internal political fight. However, the wall of silence was broken by an important personality in the Romanian Orthodox Church, His Grace the Metropolitan of Banat, Nicolae Corneanu, . Yet, this is only marginal information: it is expectable that the extent of the infiltration of the church's institutions in Romania be of the same caliber as the one in Russia-where, I reiterate, four of the six current permanent members of the Moscow Patriarchate Holy Synod were KGB agents.
It would be a mistake though to blame the "Orthodox Church" for the actions of its leaders throughout the communist regime. In reality, we are talking about a brutal action of the communist authorities against all religions, the punishment and cruel reprimand of any opposition, to which all the churches fell prey. Hundreds of Orthodox priests died in the communist prisons.
Nevertheless, the regime from Romania paid, irrespective of the succession of the policies and leaders during the 50 years, a special attention to its relation with the Orthodox Church. This was not only due to the number of Orthodox, the role of the Romanian Orthodox Church in the promotion of nationalism, but also to its ample involvement in the peoples' life, especially in the countryside. The specific politics carried out against the Romanian Orthodox Church was described as "the usual mixture of 'carrot and stick' techniques" . A whole institutional system was developed to control the religious life. The religious organisations came under the control of the Ministry of Religions. There was a direct intervention when it came to the election of the Romanian Orthodox Church's leadership. Under these circumstances, the Synod of the Romanian Orthodox Church begun to support firmly, inside and outside, operations that were ordered by the leaders of the communist regime. The leadership of the Romanian Orthodox Church participated at the suppression of a few movements of invigoration of the religious life within the Orthodoxy, of which the most important one was the "Lord's Army" . Nonetheless, it is also well known the propaganda for the communist regime from Bucharest of other religions. The leadership of the Catholic Church and that of the Mosaic religion ought to be mentioned, because of their importance in the international arena.

5.2 The nationalistic option of the Romanian Orthodox Church

Its old cooperation with the succeeding political regimes, especially with the self-declared atheistic communist regime, obliges the Romanian Orthodox Church to adopt a strategy based mainly on the nationalistic values and to resort to the two advantages it has in comparison with the other religions in Romania: 1) the principle of majority: the place of the Romanian Orthodox Church is determined by its being the majority religion; 2) the essentialist principle-to be Romanian means to be Orthodox. At the same time, the fear of the Orthodox Hierarchy to be the subject of public critics, makes it to behave offensively, thus not allowing any room for another theological or moral discourse.
A noteworthy aspect regarding the nationalistic manifestations of the Romanian Orthodox Church is its competition with the Greek Catholic Church. No other church is such an attraction for many Orthodox than the Greek Catholic Church. In Transylvania, many current Orthodox were Greek Catholics (they were compelled to change their religion under threat, in 1948) or originate from Greek Catholic families. In the last years entire villages changed their faith for the Greek Catholic one. Another detail is the pressure on the Romanian Orthodox Church to retrocede to the Greek Catholic Church the patrimony it took over after the Greek Catholic religion was prohibited. The religious theme hides thus vast material interests . Another factor would be that the Greek Catholic tradition of one of the most important parties after 1989, The Christian and Democratic National Peasant Party, encumbered the quasi-monopoly exercised by the Orthodoxy in the political arena .
Moreover, the Greek Catholic Church was an essential cultural and political factor in the creation of the national conscience and the actual reality of the Romanian State. In contrast with that, many historical interventions of the leadership of the Romanian Orthodox Church were against the trends that ended up with the formation of the modern Romania. There are more examples that are reminded by the Greek Catholic militants with a certain satisfaction. One is the reaction of the Romanian Orthodox Church from Transylvania against the initiative of the Romanian National Party to insert in its program, at the conference held in Sibiu in 1881, the fight for the independence of Transylvania and against the denationalisation of the Magyars. By means of the circular letter of June 11, 1881, the Orthodox Metropolitan Miron Românul disowned the decision of the conference of Sibiu and in the spring of 1884 took the initiative to establish the "Romanian Moderate Party" which was to militate for the status quo .
In the "Circular Letter of the Romanian Orthodox Bishops from Ardeal" (No. 2602/1916 of September 8/12, 1916/Oradea Mare) sent out in the moment Romania entered the war that would culminate with the gaining of Transylvania, the Orthodox bishops manifested their solidarity with Hungary . They expressed themselves as follows: "Romania, who was born by our Motherland, Hungary, … has perfidiously raised the arms against our Motherland and the great emperor …", etc. .
In conclusion, one of the most important factors today in Romania that opposes the tendency of the Orthodox Hierarchy to control the social life and to influence profoundly the political one remains the Greek Catholic Church. In this context it is much easier to understand the systematical efforts the Romanian Orthodox Church put forth to identify itself with the "Romanian identity" and to promote its interests through nationalism. The tradition also formalised by the Constitution from 1923, which granted the Orthodox Church the status of national church, was invoked from the very beginning of the communist regime, when the Patriarch Justinian asked for "a strong national church, comprising of all the clergy and the Romanian people from our beloved country" . The national-communism of Nicolae Ceausescu provided a large setting for the development of this tendency.
Today, the glow of nationalism accompanies most of the public actions, on different occasions and in different ways: shepherding messages, declarations and public actions of the Orthodox clergy, publications of the Romanian Orthodox Church. Besides the standpoints of the "official" representatives of the Orthodox Church, the organisations created under the aegis of the Romanian Orthodox Church give very significant signals. These are used in the campaigns the Synod can not take responsibility for. Therefore, the analyst has to give a special consideration to such organisations.
On the top of them is the ASCOR (Association of the Christian Orthodox Students in Romania), under strict subjection to the Patriarchy. A typical action for the mentality of the ASCOR is the open letter addressed to the President of Romania when both Chambers of the Parliament voted an amendment supposed to replace Article 30 of the Law on investments. This one allowed the foreign investors to buy land on the Romanian territory. According to the Open Letter, the adoption of the amendment would equal to "a contradiction with the whole Romanian policy until now who protected the Romanian land by written or unwritten laws" ; putting Romania "in the humiliating posture of a state incapable to oppose the least resistance to its foreign partner" ; the lack of "laws to protect the land shall generate serious disfunctions in the entire Romanian society" ; this would lead to the "strategic monopolizing of the land, either by the representatives of the states interested in the area, or by the propagandistic and religious centers of proselytism", etc.
A typical model of Orthodox nationalism taken on by the Romanian Orthodox Church is presented by the publication The Icon from the Abyss, a monthly magazine of "Christian-Orthodox attitude, theology, culture and art". The issue of November 1997 promoted a memorandum that denounced:
1) the adjustment of the Romanian legislation according to the unique continental legislation (the legislation of the Council of Europe and other international bodies. The authors militated for immanent Romanian provisions);
2) the renouncing to Bessarabia and Bukovina (the authors pleaded against the integration into NATO and the European Union);
3) the granting of unconditional citizenly rights to the emigrants (whom they call "social garbage of Asia, Africa and America");
4) the granting of what the authors call "privileges" to the minorities;
5) the promulgation of a law that allows the foreigners to buy land (entailing the danger of "selling our country");
6) the economical subordination of the foreign capital (a reference to the freedom of investments, privatisation, etc.);
7) the pressure exercised on the Romanian culture by the patterns launched in America, France, etc. (called "the pressure of the empire");
8) the atheistic liberalism, the chaos of the rights-right to speak, right to opinion, right to information, etc;
9) the fact that Romania was turned into a field for the propaganda of the schismatic cults and so forth.

According to a magazine published by a College directed by His Grace Teodosie Snagoveanu and under the blessing of Patriarch Teoctist, the above-mentioned policies would lead to the "spiritual and religious annihilation of one of the few Christian centers".
The most impressive manifestation of the Romanian Orthodox Church, in the sense of a nationalism capable to push the country into a religious explosion, took place at the invitation of Bartolomeu Anania, the Archbishop of Vad, Feleac and Cluj. In March 1997, he organised in the city of Cluj a religious procession of circa 2,000 priests and seminarians as a protest for the fact that the "Transfiguration" Episcopal Church was retroceded to the Greek Catholic Church by virtue of a court decision. After an impressive march in silence through the city, the prominent religious leader delivered a threatening public address, talking about the "religious disunity and the breaking of the unity of conscience of the Romanian people, especially of the one from Transylvania. The disunity stems from hatred and produces hatred. And we are at the threshold of a far bigger disunity, namely the old one, much of it healed by our priesthood and people . It is the risk of its becoming deep again. And we do not think only about ourselves, but about the entire Romanian people … Lately, waves of enmity have been rising against the Romanian Orthodox Church and through it against the Romanian people" (bolds are mine). The address refers explicitly to the use of force, although, of course, in Aesopian terms: "I want all, friends and non-friends, to know that we are standing and we shall watch and that to the fist or rod we shall reply with the cross. But it is good for them to know that from today, our cross shall be a firm one. I invite them not to take advantage of the Orthodox meekness". The identification of the Orthodoxy with the Romanian people and the threating of those who oppose its domination, including by court decision, were not for the first time expressed by the Orthodox Hierarchy. But never, until March 1997, has this thing been followed by a demonstration of force and by such a defiance of the authorities of the rule of law.
The address of the metropolitan has a extraordinary stylistic resemblance with that of Slobodan Milosevic, of June 28, 1989, from "Field of Blackbirds"/Pristina, the place where they celebrated 600 years from the battle of Kosovo (Kosovo Polje), where the kingdom of ancient Serbia was defeated by the Ottoman Empire, which brought centuries of servitude for the Serbians, but also the fight of national liberation. "Six centuries (after the battle from Kosovo Polje) we are again engaged in battles and quarrels. They are not armed battles, but this can not be excluded yet" . (Six centuries we are again engaged in …). As Misha Glenny notes, the message addressed to the Slovenians, Croats, Muslims, Albanians and Macedonians was very simple: you forget how easy it is to mobilize 1 million Serbs . At that assembly there were present "a strange mixture of communists, Orthodox Christians and Monarchists having but one thing in common-they were all Serbs" .
The spirit of the mobilizing action of Bartolomeu Anania was similar: nationalism defined on a religious basis (in this case the Orthodox nationalism); instrumentation of the masses. This strategy ensured Milosevic's victory in Yugoslavia, but at the same time it led to the disaster of the Federation. The comparison is more relevant as the manifestation and development of pluralism in Romania-against the evident will of those who got the power in that period of changes and irresistible evolution toward democratic mechanisms-was astonishingly similar to the Yugoslavian case .
Here we have a complex of situations, which makes, in general, that the Romanian nationalism be an extremely dangerous factor for the internal stability, significant for Romania's international relations and, in particular, for the regional ones. The Romanian Orthodox Church is one of the most serious and unpredictable resources of this nationalism.

5.3 Religious conflicts in Romania

After the revolution, Romania was the field of tensions that oftentimes resulted in bloody conflicts. After 1990, manifestations of collective violence occurred repeatedly. Their variety explains the difficulty of the rule of law to run subsequent to the collapse of a political regime that exercised a draconian control. Some violence was politically instrumented, such as the aggressions during the electoral campaign of April-May 1990. Under this category comes the repeated coming to Bucharest of up to 12,000 miners, used by president Iliescu to settle the matters straight with different political adversaries. On June 14-15, 1990, these bands terrorised Bucharest and in September 1991 they determined the fall of the then government. After September, the range of these violent means was reduced continually and after the political change from 1996 they were completely eliminated from the political instrumentality.
A much longer interval dealt with collective violence against Gypsy communities in conflict with the majority of the villages wherein they lived. Until 1996, there were circa 35 acts of violence, including the setting on fire of some households, sending away the Gypsies and even a few cases of homicide. For the first time in 1996 the intervention of the police forces and the punishments by court decisions of some Romanians and Magyars guilty of attacking the Gypsies have reached the dissuasive level.
The conflict with the lengthiest repercussions was the one between Magyars and Romanians and took place in March 1990 in Targu-Mures. Although it emphasized a real ethnical problem, numerous information seems to prove that its outburst was instrumented by the political forces competing for power.
All these were the subjects of international concerns. Especially the conflict with the Magyars was on the agenda of some intergovernmental organisations: the Council of Europe, the European Union, OSCE . An international concern was roused by the situation of the Gypsies, especially because of their migrating potential .
The religious conflicts from Romania that came to be on the list of the specialists and forums seem to be less numerous, probably because of their reduced publicity. However, their list is long. I would note the violent acts-from threats to physical assault-from January 1991 in Filea de Jos; October 1991, Visuia (Bistrita-Nasaud) ; October 1991, Turda ; December 1991 Margau (Cluj); February 1992, Ceaba (Cluj) ; July 1992, Tarsolt (Satu Mare) ; December 1992, Hodac (Mures) ; November 1993 against a Greek Catholic in Hopirta (Blaj) ; January and July 1993, Salva (Nasaud) ; January 1994, Romuli (Bistrita-Nasaud) and Bicazu Ardelean (Neamt) ; May 1994, Paraul Fruntii (Neamt) ; August 1994, Breb (Maramures) .
In the above-mentioned cases, the police did not intervene. Sometimes, the policemen intervened directly to prevent certain religious manifestations: October 1990, Spermezu (Bistrita-Nasaud) .
Besides the conflicts with the Greek Catholics, there have also been publicised the aggressions on the Baptists and Jehovah's Witnesses. The Ruginoasa case (December 1997) lead to international protests and the Cornereva case (April 1997) was the subject of some internal reportages well publicized. In the case of Jehovah's Witnesses, the investigations confirm the cooperation of the representatives of the authorities of the State with the Orthodox priests in their attempt to prevent Jehovah's Witnesses from exercising their faith: the cases of Rosu (June 27, 1997); Bobicesti and Lalosu (June 1997); Tantareni, Gorj County (June 1997); Cluj-Napoca (June 1997); Pitesti (July 1997), etc.
But the best known event of this sort was the prohibition of the International Convention of Jehovah's Witnesses in June 1996, scheduled to take place in Bucharest. A few ministries and other public authorities are responsible for that act of discrimination. In parallel, the Romanian Orthodox Church launched an ample campaign against Jehovah's Witnesses, supported by numerous politicians from the government and the opposition. During her visit in Bucharest, the wife of the President of the United States, Mrs. Hillary Clinton, protested against the violation of the freedom of religion in Romania.

5.4 The pressure on the democratic rule of law

All previous information shows the difficulty of building a rule of law in Romania, in the context of the ample pressure from the Romanian Orthodox Church. Although there is a legislation that punishes the hindrance of the religious activities of a religion, the Orthodox priests seem to be immune to these provisions. The instigation to actions against the religions shall be punished. Yet, the Metropolitanate of Moldova and Bukovina has not refrained from making the following public declaration: "Nor the Orthodox community, nor the Orthodox priests are responsible for what happened there. The responsible ones are those who came in the bosom of an eminently Orthodox community … and spiritually aggressed the people in their homes. They have not observed the Constitution and the common sense; they trimmed the social and Christian morals by their impudently and brazenly coming-they have probably considered the peasants ignorant-and tried to proselytize". By this declaration, the Metropolitanate replied to the conflict in Ruginoasa, a commune in the County of Iasi, where nine Baptists gathered for a religious service in a private house were abused by hundreds of Orthodox people, on December 30, 1997.
The opposition of the Orthodox Hierarchy to some legislative initiatives of the Parliament reaches as far as not recognizing the latter. When the Senate approved the "'Boila' bill of law" in June 1997, the reaction of the Orthodox clergy was prompt and vehement. Patriarch Teoctist called the legislative initiative a dictate "that may have unpredictable consequences for the peace of Transylvania, consequences of which there shall be responsible those who voted for this bill of law". The Declaration of His Grace Antonie Plamadeala, the Metropolitan of Ardeal, echoed the same threatening tone: "The 'Boila law' shall generate conflicts, mutinies with unpredictable results". It constitutes "an attack to the life of the Romanian Orthodox Church and that of our nation". The following two declarations are even more representative as far as the wish of the Romanian Orthodox Church to elude the regulations adopted by the supreme institution of the State is concerned: "I do not believe that the Romanian Orthodox Church shall allow anyone to impose himself" (His Grace Bartolomeu-Archbishop of Vad, Cluj and Feleac); "It is a gross interference of the Senate in the Church's life"; "On what grounds, mister senators?"; "Therefore, we shall never support such a law" (Andrei, the Bishop of Alba-Iulia).
Consequently, the project was never discussed in the Chamber of Deputies.
On the basis of Decree-law No. 126 of 1990, regarding the legal situation of the goods taken over by the State in 1948, the Greek Catholic Church was able to sue in court the Romanian Orthodox Church, in order to regain some worship places. In some cases the courts gave favourable decisions to the Greek Catholic Church. There are more irrevocable decisions, regarding churches from Satu Mare or from Cluj, which, despite the finalizing of all the specific procedures, the Orthodox Church refuses to carry out years after their being pronounced. This is, of course, the ultimate form of denial of the rule of law.
In some Greek Catholic churches the frescoes and different architectural elements were destroyed in the last years by Orthodox priests, although they are monuments belonging to the patrimony. None of the State's authorities dared to punish, according to the law, the priests who destroyed the monuments.
Another tendency that comes across the norms for freedom of conscience and belief guaranteed by the Romanian Constitution is the policy of monopolizing the Romanian mass media. The National Council of the Audiovisual Department promotes a policy that limits the programs of certain non-Orthodox religions, whereas the radio and the public television grant vast spaces for Orthodox propaganda. The Missionary Society has recently protested against the refusal of the National Council of the Audiovisual Department to renew the license for its radio stations opened in 1990 in six cities throughout the country .
Over a long period of time pressure has been exercised to occupy the confessional space of the University of Bucharest. The confessional meetings, the posters, the sanctifying of the residence buildings and class rooms, the affixation of candles and icons in the rooms meant for study or the initiative to erect an Orthodox Church in the courtyard of the University, finally lead to protests of the students. In March 1998, after years of intense propaganda in the University, The Office of the Senate of the University of Bucharest decided to restrict these actions. As a reaction to the decision of the Office of the Senate, the Orthodox associations denounced "the nonchalance with which such anti-Christian groups" violate their religious freedom. Patriarch Teoctist sent a letter to the board of the University, whereby he complains of "a decision that reminds us of the regime of the atheistic dictatorship" . Recently, the Romanian Orthodox Church succeeded to impose the construction of an Orthodox Church in the student complex of the University in Galati.
The financing of the cults from the budget proves to be an extremely intrusive aspect in the affairs of the State. In the case of Romania at least, this thing is not provided by a clear contractual clause. The Churches can anytime make requisitions, the State's dignitaries may anytime take the initiative to allocate goods. The State uses for the recognised religions an annual amount proportional with the number of believers thereof. But the Romanian Orthodox Church obtains a lot of funds besides this system. The religious motivations of the initiators are important, as are the political reasons. In May 1998, the Government of Romania "offered" a factory to the Greek Catholic Church from the Episcopate of Harghita and Covasna , violating the legislation in force. This act was sanctioned by the Romanian Executive with the statement: "even though it is not according to the law, it is at least for God's welfare" .
The intrusion of the Hierarchy of the Romanian Orthodox Church in the affairs of the State was constant, extremely systematic and insidious. The main instrument of this pressure was the political threat on the leaders of the governmental coalition. Until the changes of 1996, a typical pattern of blackmail consisted of financial claims, on one hand and, simultaneously, the protest against the manifestations of other religions on the other hand. In this way, the State's budget was utilised to pay for the "silence" of the Hierarchy of the Romanian Orthodox Church.
After 1996, the situation became more serious by the appointment of Mr. Gheorghe Anghelescu at the head of the State Secretariat for Religions. Starting in 1992-1993, he became an assistant, then lector and professor at the Faculty of Orthodox Theology of the University of Craiova. Gheorghe Anghelescu vowed to be faithful to the Orthodox Church, to form the Orthodox theologians in the spirit of this Church. Later, the professor of Orthodox theology manifested himself as a radical fighter for the advancement of the interests of the Hierarchy of the Orthodox Church.
On March 25, 1997, the State Secretariat for Religions elaborated a letter by means of which it affirmed that the "permission for the building of worship places (churches, chapels, houses for prayers, synagogues, mosques, etc.) or annexes thereof can only be issued to the local component parties" of the 15 religions recognised by the Romanian State. When it reached the city halls, the letter from the State Secretariat for Religions entailed the refusal or the cancellation of the construction authorisations requested by several religious associations and foundations. The Supreme Court of Justice decreed that the circular letter of the State Secretariat for Cults was illegal, but it continued to be applied by the local authorities.
All the phenomena that were listed are possible because of the authority the Romanian Orthodox Church acquired over the political class. All the leaders of the political parties felt obliged to express, in one way or another, their devotion to the Orthodoxy. During the electoral campaign, the current president of Romania invoked his Orthodox faith, while he contested that of his main adversary: the former president Ion Iliescu . He supported the Orthodox associations that carry on an Orthodox campaign in the University of Bucharest (the League of the Students from the University of Bucharest, the Association of the Christian Orthodox Students in Romania) and was politically supported by them-he also chose his advisories from their ranks. On December 8, 1990, at the celebration of the "Constitution Day", at the left of the President of Romania sat the president of the Constitutional Court, while at his right hand was the Patriarch Teoctist. After they won the elections in 1996, some of the dignitaries of the new government allowed Orthodox services to take place in their offices, in order to "drive away the wicked spirits". When the current Romania's Prime Minister, Mr. Radu Vasile, took over his mandate, he announced publicly that first he would travel to the Primate of the Romanian Orthodox Church, the Patriarch Teoctist-which thing he actually did. In November 1998, during a time of austerity foreshadowing a economic crash, the Government accepted, in principle, to share in the financing of a huge Orthodox construction, "The Church for the Salvation of the People", right in the center of the capital and contrary to any elementary reasoning.
At the same time, it is true that the population's sensitivity to the religious symbols is very high. In the polls made, 80% of the population expressed their trust in the church. The investigation made by the METRO MEDIA/Transilvania between October 1-18, 1990 showed that 3% of the population frequents the church daily, 14% a few times a week, 39% a few times a month and 43 % seldom. Even in this case, the percentage of 56% of those who go at least a few times a month to the church is very high, in relation to the average western practice. Does this figure indicate a corresponding political importance of the Churches in Romania (respectively of the Orthodox Church) in the affairs of the State? It is hard to give an answer, because this subject implies a far ampler sociological investigation that what has been done so far.

6. The onset of an alliance in Eastern and South-Eastern Europe.
Is it noteworthy?

The extremely important aspect for the role the church plays in the affairs of the State and, implicitly, in the stability of the State and of the international relations is the nature of the relations established between the power, as a system that is simultaneously connected with the institutions and the practice of the political life, and the churches. Each of the formal patterns of this relation: the secular state , the concordat , the secular state that has established a partnership with several religions , the state where there is an official church or the theocratic state define, in principle, the contour in which the churches may influence the internal and external public life.
The Russian Federation, the Republic of Moldova, Ukraine, Bulgaria, The Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, the Republic of Macedonia and Greece are all secular states. In other words, these countries consider that the religious life is of public interest, maybe that some religions present a greater interest that others, while the fundamental State institutions do not have a religious character. In all these countries, the majority church is the Orthodox Church, whose role depends of the importance, history and mentality of each society. In all the above-mentioned countries we find the double particularity: the cooperation of the majority church with the institutions of the power structure, respectively, the existence of weak states. At any rate, the Orthodoxy manifests itself in this area under the form of Orthodox nationalism, whose effects have reach as far as the international level. Such a context raises the natural question: shall the Orthodox identity transform itself in a link between the states and, maybe, in a veritable Orthodox alliance (perfected formally or just put into practice)?

6.1 The Greek anomaly

An Orthodox alliance in Eastern and South-Eastern Europe would imply that Greece should associate to the ensemble of the Orthodox states in the area. This would mean that Greece should leave its current partners from the European Union and NATO-organism that integrated Greece in the sphere of the institutionalised Europe-for the sake of a religious-cultural affiliation scarcely advantageous. No matter how unreasonable such an evolution is for the Greek State, it does not have to be totally excluded, if we keep in mind the multitude of phenomena which took, in time, this direction.
The Constitution of Greece makes the Orthodoxy a state religion . Despite its alignment to the model communities of the liberal democracies, Greece represents a typical example for the interference of the church in the affairs of the state. Through the Ministry of Education and Religion, the Greek Orthodox Church exercises an administrative control over the ensemble of the religious and educational problems. The access to the high offices in the state implies, in general, to be an Orthodox . The very functioning of the Greek legal system is religiously conditioned.
All these made Greece the subject of international critics. In the Annual Report of the Committee for Civic Freedoms and Internal Affairs regarding the human rights in the European Community, Greece is denounced for treating conscientious objectors like criminals and condemning them to many years of prison. In 1993, the European Parliament asked the Greek government to "amend the legal provisions once and for all and to eliminate even the optional mention of one's religion on the new Greek identity cards and not to give in to the pressure of the Orthodox hierarchy and the nationalistic tendencies that are currently evolving".
In turn, the European Court condemned Greece for its legislation that incriminates proselytism. The very character of Orthodoxy as state religion represents a provocation for the Greek democracy. The case of Greece confirms the opinion the UN Special Reporter Angelo Vidal Ribeiro d'Almeida expressed in his 1993 Report on the violation of the declaration: "the rights of the persons belonging to religious minorities have been affected especially in the countries where there exists an official church or one with a clear religious predominance".
Paradoxically, although a member of the main organisations belonging to the Western community, as regards its internal plan, Greece behaves atypically for this community. This is a direct effect of its Orthodox tradition.
Of course, Greece's behavior in the regional context of South-Eastern Europe can not be interpreted in religious terms exclusively. Greek-Turkish quarrel over Cyprus explains a great deal Greece's distancing from its partners from NATO and the European Union. (The Zurich and London Cyprus agreements of 1959, and the Constitution of Cyprus, which had gone into effect in 1960, generated destabilizing conflicts between the two countries, instead of calming them down .) The Americans' involvement in the internal political life in 1965 caused a real trauma. On July 15, the Papandreou government had been maneuvered out of power by King Constantine and 967 putsch masterminded by George Papadopoulos and a small conspiratorial group of Greek army colonels, against the same George Papandreou .
This is the interference of certain internal and regional historical and political factors that differentiates significantly the Greek state from its partners from the European Community and NATO. These factors rushed Greece, in a few instances, in ad hoc alliances with anti-Western regimes, the Orthodox colour thereof being a mobilizing factor. An example is the implacable opposition of Greece as regards the recognition of Macedonia, which determined an accentuation/revitalisation of its relations with Serbia . This thing created new problems for the policy of the European Community, already seriously affected from the beginning by Germany's pressure for the recognition of Croatia and Slovenia. By virtue of an affiliation with religious trends, Greece seems to have promoted within the European Union the Belgrade's politics.
Another example dates from 1997. Between November 2-4, the chiefs of the states and governments from Greece, Turkey, Yugoslavia, Albania, Bulgaria and Macedonia met in Crete for a summit organised by the host country. Greece used the setting of the Conference in order to launch the idea of a regional cooperation in which the Russian Federation was supposed to have a significant role. President Boris Yeltsin sent a tutelary message to the participants at the summit in Crete: "Russia, who has been entertaining close historical relations with the Balkan states, is not indifferent to what happens in this part of the European continent. For this reason, we also intend to participate in the future, together with the South-Eastern European states, to the realization of the useful ideas and projects … I think it is very important that, in the future, the summit of the chiefs of the states and governments of the South-Eastern Europe take place at the proposal of Greece and Russia" . This initiative of Greece was hindered in the autumn of 1997 by the opposition of the Romanian Prime Minister and the Minister of the Exterior, who saw in this initiative a tactics against the extension in the area of the European Union and NATO.
The actions of the Greek state, such as the above, with a pro-Serbian or pro-Russian character are contrary to the politics of the pan-European organisms to which Greece does belong. It is hard to imagine how a country member of the European Union and NATO would follow such tactics in the absence of the feeling of cultural solidarity that, in this case, means especially a confessional solidarity.

6.2 Russia in the area: its relation with Milosevic's regime

The power and basis of any Orthodox alliance are limited unless the Russian Federation is part of it. The pan-Orthodoxism could become a strategy of expansion of the Russian Federation in the former countries where it used to exercise its influence: Ukraine, the Republic of Moldavia, Romania, Bulgaria, Yugoslavia, etc. The theme of the cultural affiliation was successfully used by Moscow in its relation with Slovakia-and vice versa . The use of the Orthodoxy to re-conquer some strategic positions in Ukraine and Romania can not function very soon. However, a current and sensitive subject is Russia's relation with Yugoslavia.
Up to 1991, when the Soviet Union disintegrated, Yugoslavia was the theme concerning the relation between East and West and not a matter with implications on Russia's internal policy. Then, until mid-1992, Moscow did not seem to have a clear politics as to what was happening in Yugoslavia, thus sympathizing with the western politics. After that period of time, Yeltsin and the people around him have more and more reached the conclusion that Russia has to play a special role in the Balkans. This conclusion turned the support for Milosevic's regime in a cornerstone. The elections from December 1993, which allowed larger room in the Duma for the rightists (Jirinovski asked that Russia intervenes on the Serbians' side) and the communists, have strengthened the pro-Serbian discourse in the Russian external politics.
Three factors would synthesize Russia's policy concerning the events in former Yugoslavia: "Moscow's desire to exploit its historic cultural linkages without suffering from the consequences likely to flow if other states draw analogies between the two systems, Moscow's interest in becoming a good international citizen in the post-Cold War environment, and Moscow's need to reproject Russian power both to generate domestic political support and to regenerate Russian influence in Europe and more broadly" .
In Russia there have been also expressed skeptical attitudes as regards the existence of a real tendency for pan-Slavdom amid the population, even at the presidential level . However, in the Russian political fields-on the Executive, but especially on the Parliament-there is a dominant pressure for a pan-Slav mission . That this influences directly Russia's external politics is explained by the fact that, according to Paul Goble, in a democratic Russia the external politics "must now be justified to ever broader groups" . In the Duma there are several committees on international relations, commentators of external politics at each important-influential-mass media, anyway, many politicians who seek to earn capital from their positions on Russia's external relations.
The role the connection between Moscow and Belgrade plays for the regeneration of the Russian politics is manifest. By its opposition to the NATO action in former Yugoslavia-see the case of Kosovo-it demonstrates that it has the power to speak up in "its" area. Simultaneously, Russia uses the example of former Yugoslavia to obtain the Western approval for Moscow's own self-defined "peacekeeping" activities in the Commonwealth of the Independent States.
Yet, Russia has also divergent interests toward Serbia. Together with a "honourable" behavior in the international community, there is also the need to support its interests as a whole power in relation to Europe and the United States.
The interaction between the Serbian nationalism and the Russian one remains though one of the most important phenomena in the regional plan. These may come into resonance also because the religious dimension contributes, in both cases, to the defining of the "nation". Not only that the nationalist Serbians and Russians are defined by Orthodoxism, but they may also be defined by their oppositions: to Islamism, which both of them consider it a reputable adversary, as well as their opposition to the "western" churches-Catholicism, protestant and neo-protestant groups. The strengthening of the position of the Russian Orthodox Church, especially by the promulgation of the 1997 Law on Freedom of Conscience and Religious Association shall create in the future a favorable field for the increase of its role in the external plan, too .

6.3 The Romanian Orthodox Church and the international relations

Romania and Yugoslavia describe their relations as being "traditional". "Because of [the strained relations with their neighbors] Romanian and Yugoslav historiography has tended to place the relations between Romania and Yugoslavia during these years in the best light, usually with imprecise generalities" . At the end of the forties and the beginning of the fifties, the conflict between Tito and Stalin affected the relations between Belgrade and Bucharest. This situation was overcome even as early as the sixth decade. Nicolae Ceausescu promoted a special politics regarding Yugoslavia, which was a component of his strategy to get close the nonconformist movement.
Shortly after the political changes in Romania-the end of 1989-, the special relations between Romania and Yugoslavia had to face the crisis between Belgrade and the international community. Romania was obliged to participate to the embargo imposed on Yugoslavia. In this context, in 1995 the Patriarch Teoctist made a tour in Yugoslavia, in the name of the authorities from Bucharest. He also reached Pale, the capital of the Bosnian Serbs, an inconsistent act with the western politics in the area. Such "good offices" of the Orthodox Hierarchy for the Serbian State were complementary to the violations of the embargo on Yugoslavia. The great exportations of oil to Yugoslavia were confirmed only after the political changes in 1996 .
Because of their applications for the adherence to the European Union and NATO, the Romanian authorities had to adopt a public discourse sympathizing with the condemnation of the politics of Milosevic regime's by these intergovernmental organisms. The main mass media from Romania and, in general, the public adopted the same position, of condemnation of the Belgrade regime. Exceptions in this period of time were the extremist parties and the Orthodox groups, who have invoked the religious solidarity between the two nations. In the autumn of 1998, when NATO asked for Romania's support to prepare its intervention in Kosovo, the authorities from Bucharest replied shyly, seeming to be frightened by the supporters of the Orthodox solidarity with the neighbouring South-Western country.
Yugoslavia gave the Romanian Orthodox Church an opportunity to cooperate with the State authorities. Instead, the Romanian Patriarchy distanced itself from the initiatives of the authorities, when it considered that the politics thereof affects its own confessional interests. Even from the beginning of 1997, the basic institutions and, mainly, the President of Romania, have tried to arrange for a visit of the Pope in Romania, with the hope that such an action would have a positive influence on Romania's application to be integrated into NATO. Initially, they tried to convince the Patriarch to support this initiative, for the sake of interests of the Romanian State . The refusal of the Romanian Orthodox Church obliged the authorities to adopt their own tactics. When the invitation of the Pope became notorious, the Orthodox Church expressed its opposition publicly. The release of June 1, 1998 of the Press Office of the Romanian Patriarchy stated:
"[Pope's] visit [in Romania] is considered to be inopportune as long as the patrimonial misunderstandings with the Oriental Catholic Church of Byzantine Rite (Greek Catholic) shall not be solved by means of dialogue, thus coming back to the long expected confessional peace, especially in Transylvania" .
This release expresses the position of the Orthodox Church, according to which the confessional problems in Romania, including the life of other churches as well as the relations of the citizens with other churches, must be controlled by it.
By means of the captatio benevolentiae-type of diplomacy toward the Catholic Church, the State authorities arranged in Bucharest, between August 29-Septeber 1, 1998, a conference under the aegis of the greatest forum of the Catholic laymen, the San Egidio Community. The conference entitled „Peace is the Name of God" was organised by the Romanian Orthodox Church, the Presidency and the Ministry of Exterior. Soon after the event, the Greek Catholic Church accepted the negotiations with the Romanian Orthodox Church regarding the patrimony transferred to the latter in 1948, which represented a major concession. However, nothing seems to have changed, until the winter of 1998, the inflexible positions of the Romanian Orthodox Church, as far as the relations between Orthodox and Catholics were concerned, although these relations are important in the internal plan and have a bearing on Romania's external relations as well.
The relations between the Romanian State and the Romanian Orthodox Church are essentially determined by the interest of the political forces to participate at the pan-European integration processes. For this reason they are obliged to maintain a balance between the obligation to respect the human rights-in particular the right to opinion, conscience and faith-and the requirements of the Romanian Orthodox Church. The legislative framework has, from this standpoint, a top-priority importance. In the spring of 1998, the State Secretariat for Religions had sent to the Parliament a bill of law on religions, which seriously restrained the religious freedom of the members of the religions not yet recognised as such by the Romanian State. The bill of law was later withdrawn and in November 1998 there was launched a new version; the most serious provisions were not included anymore. The change may have been operated because of the critics of certain internal and international organisations in the context of the external developments, such as the promulgation in October 1998 by the Senate of the United States of the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998. Thus, there has been established a whole institutional mechanism: an Office on International Religious Freedom, Ambassador at Large for International Religious Freedom, Commission on International Religious Freedom and there have been added new competencies for the American President in response to violations of religious freedom. Romania, who is insistently asking for its integration into NATO, is directly interested in the fact that the freedom of religion turned into a criteria of the United States' external politics. The year of 1999 shall be decisive in the perfection of the legislative framework for the freedom of religion in Romania. Only the complete reaffirmation of the religious freedom, despite the intentions of the Romanian Orthodox Church to limit the promotion of other religious movements in the country, shall maintain Romania's chance to be integrated in the European Union and NATO, which is an absolute priority in the current agenda of the government.

7. Conclusions

The information presented above demonstrates the complexity of the situation in the Orthodox region from Eastern and South-Eastern Europe. The facts show the considerable importance of the Orthodox factor, but also that the interpretation of the developments in the area from a preponderantly cultural-confessional (Huntingtonian) perspective is an illegitimate reduction.
There are analysts who consider that Romania and other Orthodox countries represent a cultural area barely compatible with the playing rules of the western democracies . Such conclusions were oftentimes abusively drawn about the Islamic world. The conception/stereotypy was synthesized by John Esposito: "Modernization as Westernization and secularization remained primarily the preserve of a small minority elite of society. Most important, the secularization of processes and institutions did not easily translate into the secularization of minds and culture. While a minority accepted and implemented a Western secular worldview, the majority of most Muslim populations did not internalize a secular outlook and values" . For Reza Afshari, "these assertions are more like political positions supportive of an agenda than objective assessments of the religiopolitical conditions of our time" .
The change from an atheistic aggressive regime to a democratic one, made room, in Eastern and South-Eastern Europe, to an intense religious manifestation-with outright political implications-which may impress on the Western watchdog. This process however is but a tendency that acts among many other complementary, divergent or even opposite ones. Among the other tendencies, which are not the subject of this analysis, is the extreme amplification of the information and communication, together with the mass media explosion. Another tendency that undermines all the attempts to get the mastery over the old values, is the economical liberalism. The comments of Alya Baffoun regarding the Islamic world, prove to be even more valid for the Orthodox world: "The profit economy, competition, extraction of a surplus, and love of property which is increasingly more private and individual, all these tend to replace the ancient superstructure of honor, purity, virginity … They replace it with the cult of money and the accumulation of riches as the new source of honor and prestige these days" .
In the general context of globalisation, a number of Orthodox and political elite from the Eastern and South-Eastern Europe manipulate traditions, events and contexts that contradict the values of the liberal democracies. Their action may affect the natural evolution toward secular states and toward the states integrated into the Western civilisation whose fundament is the democratic rule of law. In some countries, the competition between the process of adaptation to the specific pluralism of the free modern democracies and the ascension of the Orthodox forces is in a very fragile balance. The restriction of the Orthodox domination in the countries with an Orthodox majority, with populations easy to mobilise around Orthodox nationalism and fundamentalism represent one of the goals of the international politics in Eastern and South-Eastern Europe. It is one of the key instruments to increase the stability in the area, just as the omission of this support is a factor of its instability.
Romania is among these countries, too. From 1990 to 1998, the great majority of the political forces in Romania expressed their desire to draw our country closer to the Western civilisation and later they asked for the integration of our country into the European Union and NATO. During all these years, the pro-European Union and pro-NATO campaigns have succeeded continually, both in the country and abroad. The advocating of the intentions though was not supported by praxis. Romania has often failed to observe the international obligations it assumed , and the principles of the rule of law are under the pressure of the Orthodox clergy and institutions, which are obviously hostile to the processes of integration into the institutionalised Europe .
The current economical and political crisis in Romania, in the context of the world economical recession, may degenerate rapidly. A nationalist alliance between the Social Democracy Party of Romania and the Greater Romania Party, supported by the Orthodox clergy, would lead to a crisis different than the one that took place in Bulgaria, in 1996; probably a serious structural degradation that would affect the democratic system to such a degree that would bring it to the "standards" of the Yugoslavian Federation or Belarus. The coupled powers of the nationalistic political forces and of the Orthodox pressure is strong enough so that Bucharest definitively turns its back on the West. Such a development in Romania may affect Ukrai]ne, too, and destabilise the entire region . The nationalist Orthodox chain that links Belgrade-Bucharest-Kiev-Moscow is an umbrella above the Balkans, capable to control all the South-Eastern Europe, to the benefit of the conservators in the Russian Federation.
That is why the affirmation in Romania of the principles of the Western democracies is a key problem of the stability and security in the area. Playing with the participation versus the non-participation to the world of the Western democracies can not continue forever without costs. An international society exists "when a group of states, conscious of certain common interests and common values, form a society in the sense that they conceive themselves to be bound by a common set of rules in their relations with one another" . The values and interests of the Euro-Atlantic region are different though of the principles of the Orthodox community from Eastern and South-Eastern Europe, as they are elaborated by the Orthodox elite and used by the most vehement extremist-nationalist political forces.
The Romanian-Hungarian relations within the frame of the Schengen Agreements

Renate Weber


1. Why this topic?

Due to various reasons, many of them rooted in the common history of the two countries, the relations between Romania and Hungary have not always been smooth. In the autumn of 1996 the two countries signed a Basic Treaty encompassing detailed provisions on the observance of their common border and of the rights of their national minorities. Following the elections which took place in Romania in October 1996, for the first time in the country's history, the Hungarian minority, through its political party, has become part of the Government. At the same time, at the political level a steady connection has been established between the Governments of the two countries. There are signs that this could be a long lasting relationship and in these circumstances it would be both normal and wise to consider and to act in such way as to determine the Hungarian minority in Romania to play a role for the enhancement of this stability.
Among other things, this depends on the right of Hungarians from Romania to freely maintain contacts with Hungarians from Hungary. This issue has got a human rights dimension, since the right of the persons belonging to national minorities to have free and unimpeded contacts across frontiers with citizens of another State with whom they share a common language, a common religion or a common culture is now regulated by several international human rights documents to which both Romania and Hungary are a party to.
During the last two years several questions have been raised concerning the enjoyment of this right in the future, due to the different stages where the two countries are in their relations with the European Union. In particular, voices from the Hungarian minority in Romania have been heard, expressing their concern on the possibility to freely travel to Hungary if this country becomes a full member of the European Union before Romania does-which is very likely to happen. Particularly due to the fact that Romania is still among the third countries whose nationals need a visa in order to get access in any Member State of the European Union and no one can predict when this situation will change.
This paper has at its foundation three main ideas:
- the prospect that Hungary will become a full member of the EU before Romania;
- the assumption that by the time when Hungary will join EU, the Schengen acquis will be to such extent part and parcel of the Community acquis that it will be irrelevant if Hungary becomes or not a party to the Schengen Agreements, too;
- the concern that Romania will keep the current status regarding travel to EU countries-in particular that her nationals will still need entry visa (although the Schengen Agreements cover more than this issue).

2. Hungary, Romania and the EU enlargement

The first hypothesis which is at the basis of this paper is that in the next future (5 to 10 years) Hungary will become a full member of the European Union while Romania will keep the current status. Of course, the dynamic of the international relations, particularly the dynamic of the enlargement process of the EU, may contradict me and the two countries may become full members of the EU at almost the same time. In such case this paper would become futile.
For the time being, the decisions taken in Luxembourg at the end of 1997 prove that it is very unlikely to have such a situation. Concerning Hungary, the conclusion is that "The European Council has decided to convene bilateral intergovernmental conferences in the spring of 1998 to begin negotiations with Cyprus, Hungary, Poland, Estonia, the Czech Republic and Slovenia on the conditions for their entry into the Union and the ensuing Treaty adjustments". While regarding Romania the decision is that "At the same time as the above, the preparations of negotiations with Romania, Slovakia, Latvia, Lithuania and Bulgaria will be speeded up in particular through an analytical examination of the Union acquis. This preparation may also be discussed at ministerial-level bilateral meetings with the Member States of the Union." (Luxembourg European Council, 12 and 13 December 1997-Presidency Conclusions).
At the same time we have to keep in mind the real capacity of Romania to overcome at least her current economic situation and her capacity to transport the Community acquis into her domestic legislation and into the institutional structure. This may take quite a long period of time therefore being possible for the two countries to join the EU at different moments, with years in between. And because such thing may happen it is reasonable to take it into consideration and to identify possible solutions in due time.

3. The European Union and the Schengen agreements

Secondly, this paper is founded on the idea that at the time when Hungary will join the European Union the provisions of the Schengen acquis will be to such extend incorporated into the EU that the fact that Hungary will not accede to the Schengen Agreements will not be relevant.

3.1. The European Union and the free movement of persons

One of the main goals of the European integration has been to create an area of free movement of persons. Provisions regulating this issue were adopted by the Treaty Establishing the Economic European Community; the Treaty of Maastricht brought further developments. The right to free movement of persons in the EU encompasses the right to reside in another Member State in order to work there even if the person in question is not a national of that state. The right is intended to enable the residents of the Union to look for work in another Member State and it is also granted to spouses and children; therefore it is seen as a main vehicle of realising the internal market of the EU.
The EC Treaty mentions that the abolition of obstacles to the freedom of movement of persons is a main objective of the Community. The Single European Act, adopted in 1986 incorporated the single market programme in the EC Treaty its purpose being to ensure the creation of the internal market within the European Communities, the free movement of persons, goods, capital and services and to abolish borders within the internal market area. The Treaty of Maastricht provides for the first time common rules for systematic cooperation between the Member States in the field of justice and home affairs. Part VI of the Treaty of Maastricht encompasses provisions on movement of persons, asylum policy, police, customs and judicial cooperation. This constitutes the third pillar of the European Union and the cooperation is at the intergovernmental level.
Despite some coordinated policies and some important accomplishments it is generally considered that the progress made in the field of the free movement of persons within the European Union has not been very far-reaching.

3.2. The Schengen Agreements

On the other hand it is considered that the Schengen Agreements and their achievements in this sphere are the most important, although they were concluded outside the EU institution, at an intergovernmental level.
The objective of the Schengen Agreements were for the first time attained by the Convention signed by Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg on 1 July 1960 which abolished the control at the internal borders of the Benelux countries and put passport control at the external frontiers of Benelux. More than twenty years later, on 13 July 1984, Germany and France signed a bilateral agreement lifting the control on persons at their common borders.
The Netherlands took the initiative to bring the Benelux countries, France and Germany into a multilateral agreement having the same purpose. The Schengen Agreement on the Gradual Abolition of Controls at the Common Frontiers was initially signed by France, Germany and the countries of the Benelux Economic Union in 1985. On 19 June 1990 the Convention Applying the Schengen Agreement of 14 June 1985 between the Governments of the States of the Benelux Economic Union, the Federal Republic of Germany and the French Republic, on the Gradual Abolition of Check at their Common Borders was concluded. Later on other countries joined the initial group: Italy in 1990, Spain and Portugal in 1991, Greece in 1992, Austria in 1995. For all these countries the provisions are already functional. Denmark, Finland and Sweden signed the Schengen Agreement and the Convention on 19 December 1996. Out of the 15 Member States of the European Union only Great Britain and Ireland did not express their willingness to become part of the Schengen area. (For them Special Protocols were concluded when the Treaty of Amsterdam was signed.)
These documents all together are known as the Schengen Agreements. Their purpose is to create an area of free circulation, a Schengen area where all controls on persons at their internal frontiers are going to be removed, the control at the external borders are going to be strengthen and the visa policies of the Schengen Member States harmonised.
Initially, the main motivation of the conclusion of the Schengen agreement was economic. A direct relationship was perceived between the abolition of the border controls and the free movement of goods, thus increasing mutual trade. Afterwards, the priorities have shifted towards the free movement of persons. Out of 142 articles of the 1990 Convention only six deal with free movements of goods. The social need, concerning the position of the nationals of third countries and integration and the need for a population policy, able to ensure the control of the migration of asylum seekers and immigrants, have become the priorities.
According to the Schengen Agreements, the Parties undertake to adopt a common policy and to assist each other on the movement of persons, particularly in the arrangements for visa. They also try to harmonise their visa policies. For example, visa arrangements relating to the third states may be amended only by a common agreement. Derogation from the common visa arrangements may be made only for overriding reasons of national policy.
Although the aim of the Schengen Agreements is similar to the aim of the measures designed to achieve the internal market, as provided by Article 7a of the EC Treaty, the Schengen Agreements, being concluded outside EU, are considered by the 1990 Convention secondary to the Community law.

3.3. The European Union and the Schengen acquis

The Treaty of Amsterdam Amending the Treaty of European Union, the Treaties Establishing the European Communities and Certain Related Acts brought more developments than ever before.
The Treaty as such contains detailed provisions on this issue. A new title was inserted, Title IIIa, on "Visas, asylum, immigration and other policies related to free movement of persons" whose aim is "to establish progressively an area of freedom, security and justice" (Article 73i). New provisions require the Council of Union to adopt "(a) Within a period of five years after the entry into force of the Treaty of Amsterdam, measures aimed at ensuring the free movement of persons in accordance with Article 7a, in conjunction with directly related flanking measures with respect to external border controls, asylum and immigration... measure to prevent and combat crime in accordance with the provisions of Article K.3(e) of the Treaty of European Union."
According to Article 73j during the same period of time the Council shall adopt:
"(1) measures with a view to ensuring, in compliance with Article 7a, the absence of any controls on persons, be they citizens of the Union or nationals of third countries, when crossing internal borders;
(2) measures on the crossing external borders of the Member States which shall establish:
(a) standards and procedures to be followed by Member States in carrying out checks on persons at such borders;
(b) rules on visas for intended stays of no more than three months, including:
(i) the list of third countries whose nationals must be in possession of visas when crossing the external borders and those whose nationals are exempt from that requirement;
(ii) the procedures and conditions for issuing visas by Member States;
(iii) a uniform format for visas;
(iv) rules on a uniform visa."
At the moment of the conclusion of the Treaty of Amsterdam, a Protocol Integrating the Schengen Acquis into the Framework of the European Union was adopted "desiring to incorporate the above mentioned agreements and rules into the framework of the European Union."
Article 2 of this Protocol mentions that "From the date of entry into force of the Treaty of Amsterdam, the Schengen acquis, including the decisions of the Executive Committee established by the Schengen agreements which have been adopted before this date shall immediately apply to the thirteen Member States referred to in Article 1, without prejudice to the provisions of paragraph 2 of this Article. From the same date the Council will substitute itself for the said Executive Committee." Moreover, the next paragraph makes very clear that "as long as the measures referred to above have not been taken and without prejudice to Article 5(2), the provisions and decisions which constitute the Schengen acquis shall be regarded as acts based on Title VI of the Treaty on European Union." This signifies that until the European Union, based on the Council's decisions, will have its own rules and procedures the provisions of the Schengen Agreements will be enforced.

4. A human rights concern

4.1. The right to freedom of movement

When the free movement is under discussion one cannot avoid references to its human rights dimension. As Article 13 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights provides:
"1. Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each State.
2. Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country."
In its turn, Article 12 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights sets forth:
"1. Everyone lawfully within the territory of a State shall, within that territory, have the right to liberty of movement and freedom to choose his residence.
2. Everyone shall be free to leave any country, including his own."
The only restrictions admitted to the enjoyment of this right concern the protection of national security, public order, public health or morals, the rights of others.
It is obvious that when it is about freedom of movement, these documents place the burden of the observance of this right on the shoulders of the State where a person already lives or has the residence. It is therefore very difficult to invoke the human rights dimension when asking a country to accept the entry without any restriction of a person who is not that country's national or does not have the residence in that territory. Of course, the restrictions must be reasonable, otherwise not only the enjoyment of the right is limited, but the right as such is endangered.
At the same time there is a general tendency, particularly on behalf of wealthy countries, to restrict as much as possible the chance of persons from third countries to enter their territory and many consider that it is not too exaggerated to assert that the Schengen area reveals a tendency to become a Schengen fortress (succeedingly, the European Union can become such a fortress).

4.2. The right to freedom of movement and minority rights

In addition to the classical right to freedom of movement, new developments were brought by international documents on minority rights. They are related to the possibility of persons belonging to minority groups to have contacts with other persons with whom they share various features. Several international documents adopted after 1990 contain specific provisions on this subject.
The Document of the Copenhagen Meeting of the Conference on the Human Dimension of the CSCE (1990), in its Part IV mentions that "[p]ersons belonging to national minorities... in particular, have the right... to establish and maintain unimpeded contacts among themselves within their country as well as contacts across frontiers with citizens of other States with whom they share a common ethnic or national origin, cultural heritage or religious beliefs" (para 32.4).
A similar provision can be found in the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Persons Belonging to National, or Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic Minorities (Resolution 47/135-18 December 1992): "Persons belonging to minorities have the right to establish and maintain, without any discrimination, free and peaceful contacts with other members of their group and with persons belonging to other minorities, as well as contacts across frontiers with citizens of other States to whom they are related by national or ethnic, religious or linguistic ties" (Article 2 para 5).
Corresponding provisions were encompassed by the documents adopted at the European level. Article 10 of the Recommendation 1201 (1993) of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe mentions: "Every persons belonging to a national minority, while duly representing the territorial integrity of the state, shall have the right to have duly representing the territorial integrity of the state, shall have the right to have free and unimpeded contacts with the citizens of other country with whom this minority shares ethnic, religious or linguistic features or a cultural identity."
In its turn the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities (1995) provides: "The Parties undertake not to interfere with the right of persons belonging to national minorities to establish and maintain free and peaceful contacts across frontiers with persons lawfully staying in other States, in particular those with whom they share an ethnic, cultural, linguistic or religious identity, or a common cultural heritage." (Article 17 para 1).
All these documents are part and parcel of the Treaty between the Republic of Hungary and Romania on Understanding, Co-operation and Good Neighbourhood (1996) which, in addition, mentions: "The Contracting parties shall respect the right of persons belonging to national minorities to maintain free contacts among themselves and across frontiers with citizens of other States, as well as to participate in the activities of national and international non-governmental organisations [Article 15 para (7)]."
It is obvious that when it is about the right of minorities to maintain such contacts the burden of its observance is shared between the State where the minorities live and the State or the States where persons displaying similar characteristics live.
Consequently, it is not only the obligation of the Romanian State, but also Hungary's obligation to ensure the most favourable conditions for the enjoyment of this right. And if a visa system may be invoke generally by EU countries when it is about the travel of Romanian citizens, without the possibility to claim a violation of an internationally protected right, this is not the case if Hungary has a visa system which affect Hungarians who hold a Romanian citizenship. If Hungary, at the moment when it will join the EU, accordingly to her obligation under the EU legislation, shares the visa system with all the other EU Member States, then any Hungarian from Romania will be entitled to claim that his/her human rights (minority rights) is infringed.

5. Searching for solutions
5.1. A controversial solution

As mentioned at the beginning of this paper questions have been raised, mainly by some leaders of the Hungarian minority in Romania on the Hungarians' possibility to freely travel to Hungary if the two countries join the European Union at different moments. A solution which has been quite vocally invoked is "the double citizenship" for Hungarians. Its supporters are not only Hungarians from Romania, Slovakia or Yugoslavia-be them community leaders or not-, but also, to e certain extent, the World Union of Hungarians. In April 1998 its president, Csoori Sandor, specifically made this suggestions, invoking not the possibility of the Hungarians from Hungary's neighbouring countries to travel within the European Union, but their right to freedom of movement in their "mother country," namely their right to maintain unimpeded connections with Hungarians from Hungary.
For several reasons I believe that the double citizenship is the worse among possible solutions. Firstly, because the use of the ethnic criterium as a basis for granting citizenship contradicts the modern idea of the "civic nation" or the "people" who encompasses all inhabitants within a state. Accepting it, means to have a State whose citizens live not only in its territory, but also in other States' territories. If this is possible in individual cases (many persons in the world have a dual citizenship) it is dangerous to have a policy which regards a whole minority whose members are citizens of another State, too. Mainly, when thinking in terms of the duties relating to the citizens toward their State/States.
Secondly, this solution may be seen as a discrimination against those Romanian citizens who either have a Romanian origin or belong to other minorities within the country. Positive discrimination is, in some cases, one of the wisest solutions. On the condition that it does not represent at the same time a negative discrimination against other persons. Undoubtedly, Romanians would have such feelings if, through the "double citizenship," the Hungarians from Romania could unlimitedly travel within the Schengen area.
Thirdly, it is the opposite of wisdom to apply solutions which could lead to the Romanians' frustration. The last thing the relationship between Romanians and Hungarians, or between Romania and Hungary, needs is disappointment, frustration, tension.
To all these one may add the interest of the Hungarian authorities to solve this problem according to the EU requirements which certainly do not envisage another 1.7 million individuals from Romania plus other several hundreds of thousands from other countries within the EU through an artificial constitutional manoeuvre.
But the authorities in Budapest are themselves obliged to consider this subject and to find a satisfactory answer, because it is at the same time a minority rights issue and a sensitive domestic political issue. In April 1998 both the Hungarian Minister of Foreign Affairs at that time, Laszlo Kovacs, and the Hungarian Prime Minister at that time, Gyula Horn, very clearly indicated that the double citizenship is not the right answer to the problem because applying it would undermine all the results which have already been achieved through the reconciliation process between Hungary and her neighbours. Unfortunately, after the 1998 elections, the new Government has had a more ambiguous position. Different official statements were made, sometime rejecting the possibility of the double citizenship, sometime considering that it is worthwhile to take it into account.

5.2. More complications: Romania's relations with the Republic of Moldova, Ukraine and Hungary from a EU perspective

In the spring of 1998 an official from the Hungarian Ministry of Foreign Affairs told me about a possible solution for Romania to break her current status in her relationship with the European Union and becoming more attractive and interesting to this structure. It was obvious that he did not express his personal opinion but something which has been discussed and is taken into account in various political circles. According to this opinion, Romania has to cut completely any possibility for the citizens of Moldova and Ukraine to enter the Romanian territory without a visa. The most important argument was that such signal would be decisive for the European Union in its endeavour to reconsider Romania's candidacy as it seems that nothing threatens the European Union more than the deluge of people from the Eastern (and Far Eastern) part of the continent.
Simplifying, the argument is that in this moment Romania is quite far from the real possibility to join the Union. Imposing visa entry and very tough control for all persons trying to cross her Northern and Eastern frontiers would be perceived as a clear political sign that Romania's option is to become a member of EU, at any price.
It is worth noting that in this opinion such political behaviour has not been conceived as being reciprocal: Romania has to send this clear signal without expecting anything. Her citizens may still need entry visa for EU countries; they may need entry visa even for Hungary, who has no intention to risk her own situation with EU. The blunt answer to my question-why would Romania take such risk?-was that this is her only chance. How many Romanian officials or politicians would take such risk, to undermine their own internal positions by restricting the free movement of the Romanians from Ukraine or the Republic of Moldova, without being sure of any success on the other part? I'm wondering how many of them would at least publicly admit that this is an option which could and should be discussed. But it is not only about taking risks. It is also a similar human rights problem: Romanians from Ukraine or Moldova have no less rights than Hungarians from Romania.
Considering the two situations, it seems that while Romanian officials do not even think of such possibility, namely imposing visa for the Romanians abroad, the Hungarian ones do not exclude it. It seems that the Hungarian officials try to explore several solutions aimed at satisfying the EU requirements while favouring the Romanian citizens of Hungarian nationality related to the issuing of visa: longer periods of stay, different procedures, other mechanisms and structures, all are considered. The fact that applying different standards between Romanian citizens would increase frustration among the other Romanian citizens and could even give rise to tensions does not seem to be a concern for them. On the contrary, the German example is invoked: Romanian citizens of a German nationality enjoy different standards than other Romanian citizens when the German Embassy or Consulate is asked to issue entry visa for Germany. Although this is regrettable as it represents a breach of the principle of non-discrimination we have to be honest and admit that the degree of frustration to which it could lead is different. The relations between Romanians and Germans were never comparable to those between Romanians and Hungarians. The latter have gone through several crises including during recent history and it will be not only imprudent but even dangerous to increase the tension through unwise approaches. The "Hungarian issue" has been the only one politically misused after 1989 and no doubt in Romania still exist political parties-or other structures, including some belonging to the media-who would immediately take advantage of any wrong decision which would maintain or increase tension between Romanians and Hungarians. And it is the responsibility of both Romanian and Hungarian officials to prevent and to avoid such possibility.

5.3. The "Nordic countries" example

A possible solution is to look at the "Nordic countries" example. Although the issue of minority rights was not under discussion in this case, the European Union and the Nordic countries expressed their willingness to preserve the achievements of the Nordic countries relating to the free movement.
Back in 1957 Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden concluded the Nordic Passport Control Agreement on the removal of passport control at intra-Nordic frontiers. A decade later, Iceland acceded to this Agreement. The passport-free zone has ensured the free movement of the persons between the Nordic countries and has been one of the central parts of the Nordic cooperation.
At the moment, out of the five Member States to the Agreement, two, Iceland and Norway, are not members of the EU. The other three, Denmark, Finland and Sweden, who are members of the European Union must comply with the Union's legislation and requirements. In December 1996 they also signed the Schengen Agreements. This new situation could have significantly alter the Nordic passport-free zone and cooperation. In order to avoid such risk the decision makers of the EU and the Nordic countries have searched for solutions.
The Protocol Integrating the Schengen Acquis into the Framework of the European Union addresses this issue "taking into account the need to maintain a special relationship with the Republic of Iceland and the Kingdom of Norway." Article 6 of this Protocol mentions that "The Republic of Iceland and the Kingdom of Norway shall be associated with the implementation of the Schengen acquis and its further development on the basis of the Agreement signed in Luxembourg on 19 December 1996. Appropriate procedures shall be agreed to that effect in an Agreement to be concluded with those States by the Council, acting by the unanimity of its Members mentioned in Article 1. Such Agreement shall include provisions on the contribution of Iceland and Norway to any financial consequences resulting from the implementation of this Protocol."
In addition, in order to properly prepare the entry into force of the Treaty of Amsterdam and its Protocols, the Presidency of the European Union proposed a working group EU/Norway?Iceland, whose activity has started on 7 November 1996. Which means that the agreements regulating the relations between these two countries and the Member States of the Schengen area will enter into force at the same time with the Treaty.

5.4. Conclusion

Would it be possible also for Hungary and Romania to find a similar solution although the two countries never lifted the passport control at their common frontier? In my opinion the answer is affirmative. The aim of the Protocol to the Treaty of Amsterdam on External Relations of the Member States with Regard to the Crossing of External Borders is to take into account "the need of the Member States to ensure effective controls at their external borders, in cooperation with third countries where appropriate." In order to do so the Protocol mentions that "[t]he provisions on the measures on the crossing of external borders included in Article 73j(2)(a) of Title IIIa of the Treaty shall be without prejudice to the competence of Member States to negotiate or conclude agreements with third countries as long as they respect Community law and other relevant international agreements."
This is a proof that the European Union is concerned to find ways to harmonise its requirements with the interests of its Member States. That is why not only the Community law/Schengen acquis but also other international agreements must be taken into consideration. Strengthening the stability and the security of the region is the common interest of Romania, Hungary and the European Union, therefore all of them must take steps in order to appropriately settle this issue. In this respect, flexibility implies negotiations with all the parties. As Article 9 para 2 of the 1990 Convention provides "the visa arrangements relating to Third States... may be amended only by common agreement of all Contracting Parties." But, as the "Nordic countries" example proves such steps must be taken in due time and as long as the EU law provides for this possibility it is the duty of the decision makers from Hungary, Romania and the Schengen/EU Member States to sit, talk and identify the right and feasible answers. In this respect, the agreement signed by Romania and Hungary in 1998 on the procedures related to the police control of the borders, eliminating the double control, each country ensuring solely the control of those crossing its national border, may be considered as a significant step. But many other actions are needed and the sooner the two countries will assume them, the better will be for their relations.

Annex-Schengen Acquis

1. The Agreement signed in Schengen on 14 June 1985 between the Governments of the States of the Benelux Economic Union, the Federal Republic of Germany and the French Republic on the gradual abolition of checks at their common borders.
2. The Convention, signed in Schengen on 19 June 1990, between the Kingdom of Belgium, the Federal Republic of Germany, the French Republic, the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg and the Kingdom of the Netherlands, implementing the Agreement on the gradual abolition of the checks at their common borders, signed in Schengen on 14 June 1985, with related Final Act and common declarations.
3. The Accession Protocols and Agreements to the 1985 Agreement and the 1990 Implementation Convention with Italy (signed in Paris on 27 November 1990), Spain and Portugal (signed in Bonn on 25 June 1991), Greece (signed in Madrid on 6 November 1992), Austria (signed in Brussels on 28 April 1995) and Denmark, Finland and Sweden (signed in Luxembourg on 19 December 1996), with related Final Acts and declarations.
4. Decisions and declarations adopted by the Executive Committee established by the 1990 Implementation Convention, as well as acts adopted for the implementation of the Convention by the organs upon which the Executive Committee has conferred decision making powers.
Article 1 "The Kingdom of Belgium, the Kingdom of Denmark, the Federal Republic of Germany, the Hellenic Republic, the Kingdom of Spain, the French Republic, the Italian Republic, the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, the Kingdom of the Netherlands, the Republic of Austria, the Portuguese Republic, the Republic of Finland and the Kingdom of Sweden, signatories of the Schengen agreements, are authorised to establish closer cooperation among themselves within the scope of those agreements and related provisions, as they are listed in the Annex to this Protocol... This cooperation shall be conducted within the institutional and legal framework of the European Union and with respect for the relevant provisions of the Treaty on European Union and of the Treaty establishing the European Community."
Paragraph 2 reeds: "The provisions of Paragraph 1 shall apply to the Member States which have signed accession protocols to the Schengen agreements, from the dates decided by the Council, acting with the unanimity of its Members mentioned in Article 1, unless the conditions for the accession of any of those States to the Schengen acquis are met before the date of the entry into force of the Treaty of Amsterdam."
National minorities protection under Romania's treaties with its neighbours

Corneliu-Liviu Popescu


I. General reflections on national minorities protection under Romania's basic treaties

Romania's basic treaties with other states fall into the constitutional category of treaties in the name of Romania.
In the case of treaties in the name of Romania, the constitutional regulations regarding them are included in Art. 91 par. (1) correlated with Art. 99 par. (2) of Romania's Constitution of December 8, 1991. These treaties are negotiated by the Government, the organ which has competences along the entire process that starts with the initiation of negotiations and ends with the signing of the treaty. The internal procedure of expression of the Romanian state's agreement which follows, includes two stages, namely the conclusion of the treaty by the Romanian President under a decree countersigned by the Prime Minister and the ratification of the treaty by Parliament by law.
On an internal plane, one more formality is to be carried out, namely the publication of the conclusion decree, the ratification law and the international treaty in "The Official Gazette of Romania".
Also, the procedure regarding the treaty's coming into force, publicity and opposability on the plane of international relations are to be completed.
As to the legal force of international treaties in Romanian internal law, it is generally settled by Art. 11 of the Constitution. By par. (1), the Romanian state binds itself to carry out exactly in good faith its commitments under the treaties it is a party to and par. (2) decides that the treaties ratified by Parliament are, legally, part of the internal law.
Under a general law principle according to which international treaties have, in the internal law, a legal force equal to the act of ratification, it follows that the treaties in the name of Romania, the basic treaties included, being ratified by Parliament by law have in the Romanian law, legal force equal to that of the law.
In addition to this, in the case of the stipulations of the basic treaties which refer to the protection of the national minorities, it is to be considered that national minorities protection, on international law level, fits into the area of human rights protection. Hence, it follows that the norms of the basic treaties regarding national minorities protection are also under the incidence of the provisions of Art. 20 of the Constitution on the relation between international law and internal law on human rights matters.
According to Art. 20, par. (1), the constitutional provisions on human rights are interpreted and applied in the light of the international treaties on human rights Romania is a party to, while par. (2) of the same article establishes that the discords between such treaties and home legislation are settled by international regulations precedence, the latter having superior legal force.
Consequently, the norms of Romania's basic treaties settling national minorities protection are part of Romania's constitutionality bloc.
The observance of these norms is ensured by both the Constitutional Court, which censures law constitutionality by reference to constitutional provisions, the latter being interpreted in the light of the norms of the basic treaties on national minorities protection and by court proceedings and other jurisdictions, as well as by the administrative authorities, the latter ones having the obligation to give priority to these norms in their possible conflict with national law legal provisions or administrative regulations.

II. General aspects of national minorities protection under Romania's basic treaties with its neighbours

Up to the present, Romania has finalised the home procedures on the expression of its agreement to be legally connected (hence, the official home publication) in the case of four of the five neighbouring states, namely the Republic of Bulgaria, the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, the Ukraine and the Republic of Hungary. The basic treaties with the Republic of Moldova is under negotiation.
A common characteristic of the states party to these basic treaties which has a strong impact upon national minorities protection is that they are members of the Organisation on Security and Cooperation in Europe.
As part of the proceedings of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe which has turned into the Organisation on Security and Cooperation in Europe, the member states adopted a number of acts with multilateral legal and political character, starting with the 1975 Helsinki Final Act. These acts are not international treaties; they are just sui generis sources of the international public law. They also include provisions on national minorities protection. All these legal-political acts, their dispositions on national minorities protection included, link together all O.S.C.E. member states, irrespective of the date when they joined the O.S.C.E. Their legal force, along with their political value, cannot be denied; yet it is different from that of international treaties which are a principal source of international law.
All Romania's basic treaties with its neighbours, as O.S.C.E. member states, contain the pledge of the two party states to observe, in the relations between them, the regulations laid down in the O.S.C.E. documents. Thereby, in Romania's bilateral relations with the neighbouring O.S.C.E. member states with which it has basic treaties, the norms laid down in these legal-political documents of O.S.C.E. are integrated into the basic treaties and have conventional value, that is international treaty legal force. We, naturally, put in what interests us mostly in this article, that is the provisions on national minorities protection, even though there is no express special mention of them, there being a general reference to the O.S.C.E. documents.
Having the legal force of international treaties, these norms are applied the previously presented constitutional principles. Consequently, in Romania's bilateral relations with the neighbouring countries which are O.S.C.E. members, with which it has basic treaties, the norms included in the O.S.C.E. acts regarding national minorities protection are part of the Romanian internal law, have legal force superior to the internal law and are integrated into the constitutionality bloc.
They represent a minimal minorities protection standard to which special norms with superior provisions are added, as we shall see further down, in some of the four basic treaties.
The common commitment of Romania and of the other state, party to the treaty, to observe the norms of the O.S.C.E. documents is laid down in the preamble of the basic treaty, yet this does not diminish its legal value in any way since the preamble is an integral part of the treaty and has the same legal force as the provisions of the content proper.
The preamble makes express reference to the two O.S.C.E. documents, that is the Helsinki Final Act of 1975 and the Paris Charter for the new Europe of 1990, followed by the generic reference to other O.S.C.E. acts. This does not mean that the norms of the rest of the O.S.C.E. documents are not integrated into the basic treaty with the same legal force.
Furthermore, this means, in our opinion, also that the two states, party to the basic treaty, in their bilateral relations, attach international treaty legal force not only to the norms included in the acts already adopted within O.S.C.E. but also to the future ones, which will automatically acquire, from the moment of their adoption, in the bilateral relations, the character of legal norms included in the basic treaty and having the same legal force. In addition to this, in the case of Romania, they will be automatically included, as regards the relevant bilateral relations, also in the national constitutionality bloc.
We shall further analyse national minorities protection under Romania's basic treaties with its neighbours in chronological order, according to the date of signing of the treaty.

III. The Basic Treaty with the Republic of Bulgaria

The Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation and Neighbourliness between Romania and the Republic of Bulgaria was signed, at heads of state level, in Sofia, on January 27, 1992, was concluded under Decree No. 53 of March 13, 1992 and was ratified under Law No. 74 of July 17, 1992, the three acts being published in The Official Gazette of Romania, Part. I, No. 174 of July 23, 1992.
It does not include any special norm regarding national minorities protection, although there is both a Romanian minority in Bulgaria and a Bulgarian minority in Romania.
In connection with the attitude of the then Romanian rulers on the national minorities protection matter, it is obvious that bringing into the international law sphere an increased protection level compared to the general minimal one was not wished for.

IV. The Basic Treaty with the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia

The Treaty on the Relations of Friendship, Neighbourliness and Cooperation between Romania and the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was signed, at heads of state level, in Belgrade, on May 16, 1996, was concluded under Decree No. 330 of August 20, 1996 and was ratified under Law No. 112 of October 10, 1996, the three acts being published in The Official Gazette of Romania, Part I, No. 250 of October 16, 1996.
A special norm, namely Art. 20, is dedicated to national minorities protection.
The states party to the treaty consider that the Romanian national minority in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and the Serbian national minority in Romania are strong and lasting bridges to cooperation and trust between the two neighbouring and friendly countries.
They pledge themselves to ensure, each on its own territory, protection and observance of the rights of the members of the two national minorities, in keeping with U.N.O. and O.S.C.E. documents, the international conventions the two states are party to and the generally recognised norms of international law.
The states pledge themselves to apply, in good faith, the international standards on the protection of the ethnic, cultural, linguistic and religious identity of the members of the national minorities and not to take actions that might run counter the basic treaty provisions.
It is noted that, apart from the assertion of a number of general principles and the reference to multilateral international norms, particular rights are not sanctioned to individuals belonging to the national minorities, neither are guarantee and control means established. The notion of national minority itself is not defined, either. There is a great difference in comparison with the basic treaty with the Republic of Hungary comprising ample regulations, international procedures included, which we shall analyse below.

V. The Basic Treaty with the Republic of Hungary

The Treaty of Understanding, Cooperation and Neighbourliness between Romania and the Republic of Hungary was signed, at heads of government level, in Timisoara (Romania), on September 16, 1996, was concluded under Decree No. 479 of September 24, 1996 and was ratified under Law No. 113 of October 10, 1996, the three acts being published in The Official Gazette of Romania, Part I, No. 250 of October 16, 1996.
Over the constitutionality of the law on the ratification of this treaty, before its promulgation, the parliamentary groups of the National Unity Party of Romania to the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies notified the Constitutional Court which, by Decision No. 109 of October 8, 1996, published in the same issue of The Official Gazette of Romania, rejected the notification for procedure reasons, without getting into the essence of the matter, as inadmissible, as it came from subjects having no constitutional right to notification.
Under this treaty, particular importance is attached to national minorities protection, a fact proved by the inclusion of this issue already in the treaty preamble (a yet singular aspect in comparison with Romania's other basic treaties with its neighbours), where the states party to the treaty admit that national minorities are an integrant part of society in the state they live in and consider that their protection is part and parcel of international human rights protection and, consequently, makes the object of international cooperation and that the normalisation of their cooperation in this area is an important contribution to both stability and understanding in Europe and the strengthening of democracy in the two countries and their integration into the European and Euro-Atlantic structures.
It is, therefore, worth noting the express reference to the fact that national minorities protection no longer represents, in the conception of the two states, in their bilateral relations, a monopoly of state sovereignty, but an aspect of cooperation on the plane of international relations, of settlement under the international public law, included. This aspect is in full concord with the present development stage of international law.
Within the basic treaty proper, the issue of national minorities protection is to be found in Art. 15 which, from quantitative point of view, is the most important article of the treaty.
The states pledge that, in the settlement of the rights and duties of individuals belonging to national minorities who live on their territory, they should carry out the European Council framework-Convention on national minorities, if in their internal law order there is not a more favourable regulation on the rights of individuals belonging to minorities. This leads to an incorporation of the provisions of the framework-Convention into the basic treaty, its norms becoming compulsory in bilateral relations, irrespective of the coming into force of the framework-Convention.
In view of protecting and promoting the ethnic, cultural, linguistic and religious identity of the Romanian minority in Hungary and the Hungarian minority in Romania, the parties commit themselves to apply, as legal engagements, the provisions defining the rights of these individuals, such as they are laid down in the pertinent documents of the U.N.O., O.S.C.E. and the European Council, namely: the document of the 1990 Copenhagen Meeting on the Human Dimension of C.S.C.E., the U.N. General Assembly Declaration on the rights of individuals belonging to the national or ethnic, religious and linguistic minorities (Resolution No. 47/135) of 1992 and Recommendation No. 1201 (1993) of the European Council Parliamentary Assembly on the additional protocol to the European Human Rights Convention regarding the rights of the national minorities.
One can note that, apart from a legal-political act adopted within O.S.C.E., mention has been made of two internal acts of principal organs of international organisations which, without lacking legal force, do not have a value equal to that of international treaties. By being referred to, however, all these acts have been incorporated into the basic treaty; they have, therefore, acquired, in the bilateral relations of the parties, the force of the basic treaty, while in the Romanian internal law they are included in the constitutionality bloc. The fact that they have been mentioned in an annex to the basic treaty does not diminish their legal force in any way, since the annex is an integral part of the treaty and its value is equal to that of the rest of the provisions.
The states party to the treaty agree that Recommendation No. 1201 does not refer to collective rights, neither does it pledge to give the respective individuals the right to a special statute of territorial autonomy based on ethnic criteria. This specification does not imply a general interpretation of Recommendation No. 1201, but merely in point of its incorporation into the basic treaty. In other words, the norms in the recommendation, which have two different legal forces, may be interpreted in two different ways. First, the recommendation has the legal force of a simple internal act of an international organisation principal organ in the multilateral relations among all European Council member states, therefore also between the two states signatory of the basic treaty. In this first respect and with this legal force of the recommendation, the interpretation made under the basic treaty is not compulsory, the organs competent to interpret the recommendation within the European Council being liable to get to a different solution, compulsory also to the two states. Second, the recommendation norms have acquired the legal force of the basic treaty, being incorporated in it, but only due to the will of the two states and only in their bilateral relations. Only because of this superior legal force, existing in the bilateral relations exclusively, the interpretation made under the basic treaty is imperative.
The states party to the treaty reassert that the individuals belonging to the two national minorities have the right, exerted individually or jointly with other members of their group, to freely express, to maintain and develop their ethnic, cultural, linguistic and religious identity. They adequately have the right to set up and keep up their own educational, cultural and religious institutions, organisations and associations that may appeal to voluntary financial contributions and other contributions, as well as to public support, in keeping with the internal legislation.
The two parties assert respect for the right of individuals belonging to the two national minorities to use their mother tongue freely, privately and in public, orally and in writing. They commit themselves to take necessary measures for these individuals to be able to learn their mother tongue and to benefit of adequate possibilities to be educated in the respective language within the state school system, at all levels and in all forms, according to their needs. They commit themselves to create conditions that should make possible the use of the mother tongue, too, in the relations with the local, administrative and legal authorities, under the internal legislation and the international engagements they have assumed. These individuals have the right to use their first name and surname in their mother tongue and benefit of their official recognition. In the zones inhabited by a substantial number of individuals belonging to the respective minorities, each state will allow the local traditional names, the names of streets and other topographic inscriptions destinated to the public to be displayed also in the language of the minority.
The states party to the treaty observe the right of the individuals belonging to the two minorities to have access, in their mother tongue, to electronic and written information and mass media, as well as to information free exchange and transmission. They have committed themselves to give these individuals the possibility, under the internal legislation, to set up and administer their own mass media.
The states have committed themselves to ensure individuals belonging to the national minorities the right actually to participate, individually or through parties or organisations, in the political, economic, social and cultural life and in the settlement of issues of national or local interest, through their representatives elected to the central or local public authority bodies. Each state, on taking decisions regarding issues concerning the protection and promotion of the national identity of these individuals has to consult their organisations, political parties or associations, in keeping with the democratic decision-making procedures envisaged by the law.
This provision is extremely important in two respects. First, because it allows for the setting up of political parties or other organisations with a political character of the citizens belonging to the respective national minorities, and, second, because it turns these parties or organisations into partners, with a consultative role, in the process of decision-making by competent public authorities, regarding issues connected to the protection and promotion of the national identity of the individuals belonging to the national minorities. Thereby, the respective minorities themselves become partners to dialogue to the state authorities and to the administrative authorities of the autonomous local communities, on the relevant issues.
The two states declare that they respect the cultural and historical tradition of the national minorities, support their efforts for the protection of the historical monuments and sites which preserve the culture and history of the minorities and take due measures for the citizens in the zones with a mixed population to know the Romanian and Magyar cultural values, respectively.
The parties respect the right of the individuals belonging to these minorities to keep up free contacts among them and over the frontiers with the citizens of other states, as well as the right to take part in activities of the national and international non-government organisations.
The states party to the treaty admit that, in the process of exertion of the specific rights of the individuals belonging to the two national minorities, any individual belonging to a minority will observe, like any other citizen of the respective state, national legislation and the rights of others. These individuals are benefitting from the same public rights and have the same public obligations as the other citizens of the state they live in.
The two states, without prejudicing the measures taken as part of their general integration policy, declare that they abstain from any policy or practice aimed at assimilating individuals belonging to the national minorities against their will and that they protect these individuals from any action meant for such an assimilation. They likewise abstain from measures which, changing the proportions of the population in the zones inhabited by individuals belonging to the national minorities, are aimed against the rights and liberties following from the international standards and norms to which they have referred.
The parties commit themselves that they will support each other in watching over the application of the basic treaty provisions on national minorities protection. To this end, as part of the periodical consultations, the states will also examine bilateral cooperation issues concerning the national minorities, following from the application of the basic treaty provisions and will set up an inter-governmental experts committee. The states will cooperate for an adequate unfolding of the procedures of O.S.C.E. and the European Council which check up the fulfillment of the commitments on the protection of national minorities, such as they are laid down in the documents of these organisations, the parties have subscribed to.
Worth noting is, therefore, the setting up of an inter-governmental experts committee to watch over the application of the treaty provisions concerning the protection of the national minorities, an international procedure for securing increased guarantees for the rights of individuals belonging to the national minorities.
The states will cooperate towards the development of the international law framework for the protection of the national minorities. They agree to put into application, within the basic treaty, the provisions of the international documents under which they will also assume other commitments towards the promotion of the rights of the individuals belonging to the national minorities. This is an extremely interesting and efficient provision under which the two parties expressly and automatically include into the basic treaty the norms of the future international legal acts to which they become party. As the provision does not make any distinction, it is not relevant whether they will be international treaties or legal acts of inferior force, as they acquire the value of an international treaty in bilateral relations.
None of the commitments laid down in the article on national minorities protection can be interpreted as implying any right to undertake any activity or to commit any action contrary to the aims and principles of the U.N. Charter, of other obligations resulting from international law or the provisions of the Helsinki Final Act and the Paris Charter for a new Europe of O.S.C.E. including the principle of the territorial integrity of the states.
In conclusion, one notes a detailed settlement of the rights of individuals belonging to the national minorities, a connection to the multilateral international commitments, the guarantee offered by the creation of a specialised inter-governmental structure, as well as the automatic and continuous improvement of the basic treaty regulations as new international norms on this matter crop up.

VI. The Basic Treaty with the Ukraine

The Treaty on the Relations of Neighbourliness and Cooperation between Romania and the Ukraine was signed, at heads of state level, in Constanþa (Romania) on June 1, 1997, was concluded under Decree No. 215 of June 3, 1997 and was ratified under Law No. 129 of July 14, 1997, the three acts being published in The Official Gazette of Romania, Part I, No. 157 of July 16, 1997.
Over the constitutionality of the law on the ratification of this treaty, before its promulgation, the Supreme Court notified the Constitutional Court which, under Decision No. 338 of July 18, 1997, published in The Official Gazette of Romania, Part. I, No. 163 of July 21, 1997, established that the notification was inadmissible for procedure reasons, without getting into the essence of the matter, as the Constitutional Court had not been referred to legally, one of the two notifications of the Supreme Court not being motivated and the other one, not getting the majority of votes of the judges present and being tardy. We have to mention the fact that the first notification dated July 11, 1997, which was not rejected as tardy (so, per a contrario, it was brought in due time), was solved, together with the second, under the decision issued on July 1997, while the President of Romania issued the decree on the promulgation of the ratification Law No. 335 of July 12, 1997, therefore unconstitutionally, as he had not the right to promulgate a law, if the Constitutional Court had been notified by an a priori control, before this Court rejected the notification of unconstitutionality or before the Parliament re-examined the law following the objection to unconstitutionality of the constitutional jurisdiction.
National minorities protection is established by Art. 13 of the basic treaty, the most extended article of the treaty.
For the protection of the ethnic, cultural, linguistic and religious identity of the Romanian minority in the Ukraine and of the Ukrainian minority in Romania, the two parties commit themselves to apply the international norms and standards establishing the rights of the individuals belonging to the national minorities, namely those norms and standards which are included in the European Council framework-Convention on national minorities protection as well as in the Document of the 1990 Copenhagen Meeting of the Conference on Human Dimension of O.S.C.E., the U.N. General Assembly Declaration on the rights of individuals belonging to the national or ethnic, religious and linguistic minorities (Resolution No. 47/135) of 1992 and Recommendation No. 1201 (1993) of the European Council Parliamentary Assembly on an additional protocol to the European Human Rights Convention concerning the rights of the national minorities, with the specification that this recommendation does not refer to collective rights and does not compel the contracting parties to give the respective individuals the right to a special statute of territorial autonomy based on ethnic criteria.
The legal effects of the reference to these international acts, as well as of the interpretation agreed upon by the parties are the same as those of the basic treaty with the Republic of Hungary. The only difference lies in the fact that the indication of the international documents and of the interpretation are done in the treaty text proper and not in an annex, but this is exclusively a matter of form, of legal technique, and there is no difference as to the legal force of the relevant texts.
The basic treaty contains a very important settlement, namely one that delimits the notion of national minority in the case of this treaty, specifying that the Romanian minority in the Ukraine and the Ukrainian minority in Romania, respectively, include Ukrainian citizens and Romanian citizens, respectively, irrespective of the regions they live in and which, according to their free option, belong to this minority in virtue of their ethnic origin, language, culture or religion.
The two states commit themselves to adopt, if necessary, adequate measures for the promotion, in all fields of economic, social, political and cultural life, of full and real equality between the individuals belonging to the majority population. In this respect, they adequate consider the actual conditions of the individuals belonging to the national minorities.
The parties reaffirm that the individuals belonging to the national minorities have, especially, the right, exerted individually or together with other members of their group, to free expression, to the maintenance and development of their ethnic, cultural, language and religious identity, the right to keep up and develop their own culture, protected from any attempt at assimilation against their will. They have the right to exert their human rights and fundamental freedoms fully and effectively without any discrimination and in conditions of complete equality to law. The individuals belonging to these minorities have the right to actually participate in public affairs, also through representatives elected according to law, as well as in cultural, economic and social life.
The states pledge to create to individuals belonging to the two national minorities equal conditions for the study of their mother tongue. They reaffirm that these individuals have the right to be instructed in their mother tongue, in a necessary number of schools and state institutions of education and specialisation, located according to the geographic distribution of the respective minorities.
These individuals also have the right to use their mother tongue in their relations with public authorities according to the national legislation and the international engagements of the parties.
The parties admit that, in exerting their right to association, the individuals belonging to these national minorities can set up and keep up, according to the internal legislation, their own organisations and associations, as well as education, cultural and religious institutions and establishments.
Here, there is no question, like in the case of the basic treaty with the Republic of Hungary, of an express indication of parties or other organisations with a political character, consultations partners in decision-making.
The states party to the treaty commit themselves to observe the right of the individuals belonging to the national minorities to have access, in their mother tongue, to information and mass media as well as to free exchange and transmission of information. They will not put up obstacles to the setting up and use, by these individuals, under the internal legislation of each state, of their own means of mass information. The individuals belonging to the national minorities have the right to keep up contacts among them and across frontiers with citizens of other states and to take part in the activities of non-government organisations on both a national and an international level.
The two parties declare that they will abstain to take measures which, changing the proportions of the population in the zones inhabited by individuals belonging to the national minorities, are aimed at reducing the rights and freedoms of these individuals, following from the previously mentioned international standards and norms.
Any individual belonging to a national minority who considers that the rights protected under this article have been violated, has the right to address a petition to the competent state authorities, using available legal procedures.
This is an extremely important provision which allows for the stipulations of the basic treaty on national minorities protection to be directly applicable in the internal legal order of the two states party to the treaty, irrespective of the national constitutional provisions referring to the relation between the internal law and the international law, they being liable to be invoked before the national administrative and legal authorities. The protection ensured is exclusively national.
The parties recognise the obligation of the individuals belonging to the national minorities to be loyal to the state whose citizens they are, to abide by the national legislation and to observe the rights of the other individuals, especially the rights of those belonging to the majority population or to other national minorities.
None of the provisions of the article on national minorities protection can be interpreted as limiting or denying human rights which are recognised in keeping with the laws of the two states or the agreements concluded between them. None of these provisions can be interpreted as implying the right to undertake any activity or to commit any action contrary to the aims and principles of the U.N. Charter, of other commitments following from international law or the provisions of the Helsinki Final Act and of the Paris Charter for a new Europe, including the principle of the territorial integrity of the states.
With a view to cooperating for the fulfillment of the engagements on national minorities protection under the basic treaty, the parties have pledged to set up an inter-governmental joint commission which will hold at least one annual session. Like in the case of the basic treaty with the Republic of Hungary, this will be a special inter-governmental organ.

VII. Brief conclusions on national minorities protection under Romania's basic treaties with its neighbours

One should notice, first, an extremely great difference in approaching matters. While the basic treaty with the Republic of Bulgaria does not contain any special norm on national minorities protection and the one with the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, though including such a norm, it is extremely vague, the regulations in the basic treaties with the Republic of Hungary and with the Ukraine are comprehensive and detailed, specifically settling both rights of the individuals belonging to these minorities and procedures to guarantee their observance.
Second, settling, however briefly, national minorities protection under three of the four of its basic treaties with its neighbours, Romania and the party state have agreed that the protection of the respective national minorities on their territories does not belong to the area exclusively reserved to state sovereignty, but also gets into the field of settlement of international public law, being a domain of inter-state cooperation. This is expressly indicated in one treaty, that with the Republic of Hungary.
Third, in the last two treaties, one notices a connection to international standards, the incorporation of the multilateral agreements on that matter into the basic treaties,
Fourth, the level of conventional international norms being maintained, individual rights are sanctioned and guaranteed to the persons belonging to the national minorities, while the relevant right can be exerted individually or jointly with other members of the group, not collective rights of the national minorities.
Fifth, one of the treaties, that with the Republic of Hungary, makes of the parties or organisations of the national minorities partners for consultation of public authorities on matters regarding the identity of these minorities.
Last but not least, it is extremely interesting and useful that, under the same last two treaties, an inter-governmental organ is set up for watching over the application of the basic treaties' provisions on the protection of the national minorities, as a supplementary guarantee, by an international procedure.
It is clear that, on the matter of the national minorities which continues to be a delicate one to many European states, only international cooperation between the states concerned, as well as the international dialogue with the national minorities, not the invocation of an outdated absolute sovereignty of the state, is the way to ensuring the protection of national minorities, fighting xenophobia, hatred, discrimination and prejudices, to promoting human rights and dignity without discrimination. The national minorities are and must remain elements of spiritual enrichment of the population of a state, as well as of advancing friendly relations with other states.
The ratification of the basic treaty between Hungary and Slovakia
and its impact on the relations between the two countries

Judit Hamberger


On March 28, 1996 the Slovak National Council (Slovak Parliament) ratified the treaty on goodneighborly relations and friendly cooperation between the Slovak Republic and the Hungarian Republic, commonly referred to as "the basic treaty". The atmosphere the basic treaty gave rise to as well as the political developments in Slovakia during a year-long dilly-dallying over the ratification by the Slovak side proved that a treaty cannot clear the Slovak-Hungarian relations at once, as the Slovak Foreign Minister Juraj Schenk put it, "of all their alluvium." Both states have to undergo considerable efforts, the level of the whole society, in order to make these relations reach the level required by the values of the European political space.
In both countries as well as internationally, the basic treaty was expected to improve Slovak-Hungarian relations by freeing them from burdens inherited from the past and to serve as a realistic framework for the strengthening of mutual confidence. It was also hoped that the ratified treaty would considerably contribute to the stability of the Central European region. Slovak Prime Minister Vladimír Meciar and Foreign Minister Juraj Schenk both said the treaty would be an important milestone in Slovakia's integration into the Euro-Atlantic structures.
The treaty was expected to solve two basic problems in the relations between the two countries. The Slovak side expected it to guarantee Slovakia's territorial integrity as well as the safety of its current borders, while the Hungarian side puts weight on the nurturing and preservation of the Hungarian national identity of the 600,000-strong Hungarian minority in Slovakia. Political groups in both countries expressed reservations about the other. These originate from fear of and aversion to each other: the Slovaks were afraid of Hungary raising territorial claims, while there was considerable public concern in Hungary that Slovakia was seeking to assimilate its Hungarian minority. Thus, the objective of the basic treaty was to ease the Slovaks' fear of territorial changes and to protect the Hungarian minority against assimilation.
The solution of these two basic problems, as the twin main goals of the treaty, seemed to be a Sisyphus labour not so much for the Hungarian society as for Slovakia's, and for the ethnic Hungarian community in Slovakia. Within Slovak society forces dominant in the political atmosphere around the ratification of the treaty displayed acute Hungarophobia. This explained the recurring charges levelled at the Hungarian minority, whose response has been one of "radical shutting up".

A Treaty Made of Compromises

In arguing for the necessity of ratifying the treaty, Slovak Foreign Minister Schenk as well as Prime Minister Meciar have pointed out several times that a treaty between two countries, by its very nature, could not be anything else but a compromise.
This argument was primarily used against those nationalist extremist arguments according to which the treaty was not perfect. The text of the treaty was the result of what the two sides could agree upon. Meciar said people would have liked the treaty to be a total victory over the Hungarians. This could not be achieved, however, as it would have meant the Hungarian side's total defeat. The treaty was in effect, Meciar said, a compromise by which both sides obtained something and both sides' interests were, at least partially, taken into account.
Although the treaty was a compromise, the interests of the Slovak nation and the Slovak state were not hurt because Slovakia resisted the Hungarian claims. According to Schenk, it was not on Slovakia but on Hungary that the West put great political and economic pressure to sign the treaty. So it was not by accident that Hungary all but gave up at the very last minute five of its most important claims. According to Schenk, there were originally major differences between the Hungarian and the Slovak drafts. The two sides had different points of departure with regard to the "settlement of the rights of persons belonging to a minority". The Slovak side was unwilling to accept any settlement that would have gone beyond Slovakia's domestic legal regulations or the obligations that Slovakia had assumed by adhering to the Council of Europe's Framework Convention on the Protection of National Minorities.
As to the borders, Slovakia's standpoint was to demand that Hungary should acknowledge in the wording of the treaty the internationally accepted current status quo, established by the 1920 Trianon peace treaty. According to Schenk, in the final round of the negotiations the Hungarian side gave up its claim that the first article of the section on the borders should explicitly contain the reference to the 1975 Helsinki Final Act of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE) which, in its first principle, allows changes to borders by peaceful means. So the third principle of the Helsinki document concerning the inviolability of borders was applied, Hungary renounced any territorial claim for all times, meaning that it will not be possible to ever alter borders. According to Meciar, "This treaty has consolidated Trianon and it can never be questioned. By this a historical process has been ended forever."
The compromise made by the Slovak side was to agree to the inclusion in the treaty of the Council of Europe (CoE) Recommendation No. 1201, without which, as State Secretary for Foreign Affairs Jozef Sestak stated, the treaty could not have been born. Without this provision, the Hungarian side would have refused to sign the treaty. According to Sestak, the manner in which autonomy is mentioned in Recommendation 1201 was "uninteresting" from a legal viewpoint. During the negotiations, the Hungarian side put forward a strongly worded claim to collective rights and a firm demand for autonomy. Sestak said it was because of considerable patience on the Slovak side and the steady defence of the interests of the Slovak state and nation that the Hungarian side could finally be dissuaded from insisting on these claims and the treaty was cleared of them. CoE Recommendation 1201 is compiled in the treaty so that the only relevant and mandatory document concerning international law is the Framework Convention on the Protection of National Minorities containing the entire Recommendation 1201 except for Article 11, which refers to collective rights. So the Framework Treaty does not contain the acknowledgement of any collective right but only protects the individual rights of minorities' members. The Framework Convention would be above Recommendation 1201 as a higher-level legal document.
The treaty was built on compromises of uneven weights. It considers both the individual and collective problems of people belonging to a minority, as well as their solutions, as being the country's own internal affair. In the preamble to the treaty, both parties agree that persons belonging to a minority constitute an integral part of the society and state of the signatory party on whose territory they live. Consequently, the other state has no right to exert any authority on them. Schenk also confirmed that Slovakia had not agreed to any international committee of experts participating in the drafting of the Slovak law on the use of minority languages. The Hungarian negotiating Party fully accepted the Slovak standpoint and abandoned its original concept.
Pondering the compromises concerning the basic problems Slovak-Hungarian relations, one can conclude that the basic treaty, in its final form, expressed the Slovak side's demand for the consolidation of the borders of the Slovak state and the inviolability of its border with Hungary clearly and unambiguously. The question, then, is to what extent the provisions concerning the national minorities could, by means of the treaty, ensure a guarantee against Slovakia's possible intention to assimilate its Hungarian minority.

EoC Recommendation 1201 as the Main Obstacle to Ratification

In the course of the debates over the ratification of the treaty, Slovak politicians from both the governing coalition and the opposition emphasised that there was a major defect in the treaty, i.e. the inclusion of CoE Recommendation 1201 and, within it, of Article 11. Wherever minorities constitute locally a majority, this article explicitly allows for autonomous local organisations or for special status, in conformity with the country's legal system. The Slovak Republic's domestic legal system, however, does not contain a similar norm and does not allow it either. Introducing it would completely depend on Slovakia's parliament, where the distribution of mandates is unlikely to change so as to lead to the acceptance of such norms in the next few decades. As Meciar put it, "as long as the parliament does not depend on (Miklos) Duray's suspenders, as was the case before November 1994, nothing can come to endanger this situation".
Slovak politicians made great efforts to exclude from the treaty any possibility of autonomy for minorities. The nationalist parties of the governing coalition demanded that because of the controversy over the interpretation of Recommendation 1201, parliament should pass its own resolution over the interpretation of the treaty, the aim of which was to exclude any collective rights and any form of autonomy for minorities.
According to Meciar, Slovakia did not waste time between the signature and the ratification of the treaty and passed several domestic laws and signed international documents "to guarantee that what everybody feared would never happen, i.e. no form or interpretation of collective right would ever come into force as a result of the treaty". According to Schenk, a certain number of Hungarian politicians had no political program other than irredentism. These political forces should be opposed in Slovakia, but solely by political and legislative means.
The Slovak side has found the way by which the inclusion of Recommendation 1201 would not jeopardise the Slovak state's interests. The Prime Minister and the Foreign Minister assured the discontented and grumbling Slovak politicians that guarantees had been built in the treaty to eliminate Article 11, i.e. to restrict its scope to individual rights of minorities. The Slovak Republic even confirmed this interpretation by means of an official memorandum. The key to this restriction was the Framework Convention on the Protection of National Minorities. Thus Recommendation 1201 will be valid on the basis of the basic treaty, but in a way that does not conflict with the Framework Treaty.
Slovak Prime Minister Meciar explained this as follows: "In order to prevent any abuse of the treaty due to a different interpretation by each side, we have taken preventive measures, including political and diplomatic steps, to get the Framework Convention on the Protection of National Minorities accepted as part of the treaty. In addition, we have also drafted other laws." (Such as the laws on the state language, on the defence of the Republic as part of the Criminal Code, and on a modified geographic division of the country into new administrative units, and in connection with it, a new electoral law too.)
The simultaneous application of Recommendation 1201 and of the Framework Convention on the Protection of National Minorities was conceived by the Slovak authorities as leaving room for specific interpretations. "On the basis of internationally accepted legal norms", said Schenk, "the Framework Convention represents the upper limit.". Another phrase that was likely to cause confusion and conflicts over its interpretation stated that the norms involved in the Recommendation 1201 are to be meant as legal obligations only if they are authorised by the country's domestic legislation. The complex evolution from the Recommendation 1201 to the Framework Convention on the Protection of National Minorities explains why there are different opinions as to the standards of the Council of Europe with respect to the treatment to national minorities. The Party who focuses on Recommendation 1201 and its being a part of the basic treaty will look to some form of minority autonomy, while the Party who opposes collective rights will interpret the general principles of the Framework Convention to the contrary.

Slovaks Complexes

Slovak politicians in power till 1998 encouraged a Hungarophobia, including a maniacal fear of the minorities' collective rights. In order to strengthen this complex and to demonize collective rights, those in power made up and continuously nurtured certain myths.
One of these myths is that, should a minority be given collective rights, this would adversely affect stability both in the country involved and at large. This assumption was justified by the Slovaks' "experiences in the past" (Schenk). According to the logic of the politicians of the Slovak National Party, should Hungarians receive collective rights, they would be entitled not only to cultural and educational autonomy, but also to territorial and ethnic autonomy. And as soon as they would have gained the latter autonomy, it would be just a step toward declaring their separation from Slovakia and another toward joining Hungary.
It was part of the political program of the Slovak leadership in power till 1998 to maintain, and often even whip up, the Slovaks' fear of the Hungarians. On the eve of the parliamentary debate on the ratification of the treaty, Prime Minister Meciar mentioned that "three times in the past 100 years Hungarian troops left our country in the role of an occupation army." The same week, a film with a message that Hungarian weapons killed countless Slovaks was aired twice on Slovakia's main television channel. According to Slovak Foreign Minister Schenk, most representatives of the Hungarian political parties are extremists, and while their claim at present is limitless autonomy, their final goal is to achieve their irredentist ideas. Schenk also said that Hungarian extremists go so far as to deliberately discredit Slovakia internationally.
The reason why Meciar presented the Hungarians' autonomy claim as a grave threat to the Slovaks was to prove the necessity of preserving his coalition's majority in parliament, without which Hungarians' claims could not be rejected. "The treaty was a signal to the nation that a redistribution of the parliamentary seats after next elections could be a grave threat to Slovakia." What made the political situation of the Hungarian minority even worse was that for a period not only the Slovak leadership but also a part of the opposition refused to negotiate with them about their problems.
A question asked by a viewer to the panel on a TV show just before the parliamentary debate on the treaty ratification showed how effective the government's anti-minority propaganda was and how much the average Slovak citizen was misled about the Hungarian minority's political situation: "How is it possible that Mr. Duray still has a seat in the Slovak Parliament? Why hasn't he still been expelled form Slovakia?"

Evolutions and Conclusions

All of the internal policy problems engendered by the ratification of the treaty indicated that what Slovakia signed in 1995 was a fundamental document, one that went beyond the degree of tolerance and democracy of the country's leaders of the moment. Retrospectively, there are reasons to judge the Slovaks' signing of the treaty in 1995 and the ratification of 1996 as positive steps. But beyond the ratification itself, the political decision-makers never actually fulfilled the obligations they have bound themselves to fulfil. The Meciar government has never been capable or willing to create the mechanisms specified by the basic treaty, that could regulate the problems that arose between Slovakia and Hungary. Not even the 15 mixed, intergovernmental Slovak-Hungarian committees were created. The main obstacle was the fact that, due to the positions of the Slovak authorities, the representatives of the Hungarian minority could not assume their places in the mixed committees supposed to monitor the situation of the minorities' rights. Another obstacle was the general feeling of the Slovakian politicians that Hungary does not mind the treaty except only insofar as it protects the national minorities.
This view of the basic treaty changed only after the parliamentary elections of September 1998. A radical change of power took place-Vladimir Meciar and the Slovak nationalists have lost their power position. The access to power of the old democratic opposition, with a pro-Western mentality, the general conception on the treaty and on the Slovak-Hungarian relations in general have changed.
One of the signs of this change is the fact that the Hungarian minority became a part of the government. The most dubious dispositions of the law regulating the use of language have been changed; a new program of bilateral relations has been adopted. Right after the constitution of the new cabinet, the new Slovak government initiated negotiations with the Hungarian government and reached an agreement on the way the basic treaty should be put into practice. The new line of the Slovak government has been greeted by the Hungarian government. Hungary ensured Slovakia of its support for its aspiration to become a part of the Euro-Atlantic structures; the two ministers of transportation have agreed in 1998 on building the Esztergom-Parkany (Sturovo) bridge. The bridge, connecting the Slovak and the Hungarian banks of the Danube, had been destroyed during World War II. The Hungarian Prime Minister initiated the renewal of the cooperation between the Visegrad states so as to ensure a better support for Slovakia. The two Foreign Affairs Ministers signed a statement of intentions on the application of the instruments specified by the basic treaty, with a particular reference to the establishment of the 11 mixed inter-ministerial commissions (among which the Committee for Minorities). According to the provisions of the treaty, the Slovak Minister of Education re-established the institution of bilingual schooling certificates and bilingual administration of schools.
The Hungarian Prime Minister as well as the Minister of Foreign Affairs have stressed several times the fact that the Slovakian elections have been a turning point which allowed for a new chapter in the relations between the two countries. In order to emphasise this even further, the Hungarian Prime Minister stated that the next summit of the Visegrad countries should be organised in Bratislava rather than Prague (as it had been initially decided). In order to express its own good will, the Slovakian part promised the adoption of a law on the use of minority language and even the amendment of the Constitution.
The period that has passed since the parliamentary elections in Slovakia shows that the substance of the Hungarian-Slovakian relations depends on the internal policies of the two countries. The same is true of the interpretation of the basic treaty. While after the signing of the treaty in 1995 the political will prevented its coming to life, the 1998 elections have engendered rapid progress in this direction. The Hungarian side even mentioned a possible enlargement of the cooperation framework and maybe the signing of new treaties.
In this context, the basic treaty between Hungary and Slovakia may become the basis of the cooperation envisaged by the letter as well as the spirit of the document. It will thus be able to serve its purpose: that of an objective, rational, constructive and exemplary resolution of possible tensions in the relations between the two countries and the tightening of their partnership.

Sources:

1. "Kroky" ("Steps"). A political debate on the problems of the Slovak-Hungarian treaty on Slovak Television, December 17, 1995

2. "Ako dalej, Pán premiér?" ("What to do now, Mr. Prime Minister?") A political talk with Vladimir Meciar on the Slovak-Hungarian treaty and Slovak-Hungarian relations on Slovak Television, December 19, 1995

3. Slovak Foreign Minister Juraj Schenk's address to Parliament prior to the debate on the ratification of the Slovak-Hungarian Treaty, December 20, 1995

4. Recommendation 1255 and Document 7228/ the Report of the Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights-Rapporteur Mr. Bindig

5. Order No. 484/1993 of the Parliamentary Assembly

6. Order No. 508/1995 on fulfilling the obligations and commitments made by Council of Europe member States

7. Gabriel Andreescu, "Recommendation 1201 and a Security (Stability) Network in Central and Eastern Europe", in International Studies, No. 3, 1997, pp. 49-63

8. Stefan Troebst, "The Council of Europe's Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities Revisited", Paper given at the 30th National Convention of the American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies, Panel 5-28: 'Europe and the Protection of National Minorities', Boca Raton, Florida, 24-27 September 1998.

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