US
State Department Publishes Annual Report on Human Rights
US
State Departement published its newest country reports on human
rights practises for the year 2007. In the report on Romania
the Csangos are mentioned twice: on the subject of restricted
religious freedom and language classes.
About religious freedom, the report says:
"A Roman Catholic Csango community, an ethnic group that
speaks a Hungarian dialect, alleged the Roman Catholic Bishopric
of Iasi continued to oppose holding religious services in Hungarian,
despite a 2005 CNCD [National Council for Combating Discrimination]
decision that denying religious services in the mother tongue
is a restriction on religious freedom."
Furthermore, the report contains this years' facts on language
education:
"In the Moldavia region where the Roman Catholic Csango minority
resided, the community continued to operate government-funded
Hungarian-language school groups; 988 students in 14 localities
received Hungarian language classes during the 2007-08 academic
year. However, 66 students did not receive Hungarian-language
classes following an intimidation campaign waged by the school
and local authorities that made the parents withdraw the applications
for such classes."
The villages not mentioned by name where these incidents happened
are Gajdár and Lujzakalagor. Since then, three teachers of the
Association of Csango-Hungarians in Moldavia organize extracurricular
activities instead. In
last year's country report on Romania it is mentioned
that 7900 children did not receive Hungarian language classes.
Although it is not written in the current report, the situation
has not improved much. In Moldavia approx. 9000 children speak
or at least understand Hungarian, but we can provide only 1400
of them in 19 villages with language classes. It would be necessary
to expand our education program to 30 more places, as long as
teaching Hungarian for native speakers is still possible in Moldavia.
