Hungary's foreign minister has said that Ukraine has failed to fulfil its NATO commitments by seriously violating minority rights and adopting the new Education Act.
Péter Szijjártó, minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade, said in addition to contravening its commitments towards the European Union, "Ukraine has also failed to fulfil its NATO commitments."
The minister made the remarks in Brussels on Wednesday during the recess of the two-day meeting of NATO foreign ministers.
“In its annual national program, Ukraine undertook to respect and develop minority rights, but the adoption of the new Education Act is totally at odds with this. By adopting the Education Act, Ukraine is not performing a bilateral campaign against Hungary, but is failing to fulfil its international undertakings," the minister said.
“If it is important to Ukraine to restore its cooperation with NATO, then it must withdraw the Education Act. And if there are other countries for which it is important for dialogue to be re-established, then they should convince Ukraine to conform to its international commitments," he added.
Minister Szijjártó declared that Hungary is not prepared to sacrifice the interests of the Hungarian minority in Transcarpathia, and accordingly it is against NATO accepting the situation that has been brought about by Ukraine. “If Ukraine retracts the legislation, Hungary will once again be one of the loudest proponents of Ukraine’s European and Euro-Atlantic aspirations," the minister said.
“If Ukraine wants Transcarpathian Hungarians to acquire a better understanding of the state language, then it should develop the effectiveness of Ukrainian language teaching, but it cannot take away the right of the Hungarian minority to attend school in their native language," he concluded.