Select Committee on Foreign Affairs Written Evidence


Memorandum submitted by HE Mr Grigory B Karasin, Ambassador of the Russian Federation

  Article 2 of the 1994 Russia-EU Partnership and Cooperation Agreement (PCA) contains a provision for the Parties' commitment to democratic principles and human rights as defined in the Helsinki Final Act and the Charter of Paris for a New Europe. One has to ascertain that not all countries that are joining the EU fully meet these criteria. For example, a number of documents and reports of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, the Council of Europe Advisory Committee of the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities, European Commission against Racism and Intolerance, United Nations Commissions for human rights, the elimination of racial discrimination, the prevention of torture, economic, social and cultural rights, the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights, as well as assessments made by the OSCE High Commissioner Minorities Rolf Ekeus and the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights Alvaro Gil-Robles testify to the remaining problems in Latvia and Estonia in the field of the protection of human rights and national minorities, such as a high number of stateless persons, lack of guarantees of a proper education in one's native language and its use in the areas of compact residence of the Russian-speaking minority, etc.

  The following steps from the Latvian and Estonian authorities could facilitate rectifying the lack of conformity with Russia-EU PCA criteria:

    —  Joining the fundamental European human rights conventions, first of all the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities (Latvia has signed it but has not ratified it, Estonia has ratified it with the reservation that it was not applicable to non-citizens) and the European Charter for Regional or Minorities Languages (not signed either by Latvia nor Estonia).

    —  Implementing a dramatic change in the approaches towards naturalisation in order to secure the possibility for the predominant part of the Russian-speaking minority to participate in democratic processes (replacing the language examination that is part of the naturalisation procedure with state-financed national language courses, abolishing history/civic studies examination due to its excessive political orientation, introducing a simplified naturalisation procedure for the elderly, granting former Russian military servicemen and members of their families the right to citizenship), the removal of other political restrictions on naturalisation.

    —  Revising the legislation in order to guarantee the conservation of a state system of secondary education in the Russian language, as well as the relevant changes in the plans for a school reform affecting both the reform itself and its time-frame.

    —  Rendering it possible to use the Russian language at official level in areas of compact residence of the Russian-speaking minority.

    —  Creating conditions for the effective participation of the Russian-speaking minority in a dialogue with authorities on issues of policy regarding national minorities.

  The above-mentioned measures would bring the situation on the protection of national minorities in Latvia and Estonia closet to those standards that already exist in most European countries and, with EU assistance, are being implemented in respect of minority rights in Macedonia (Ochrid agreement) and Slovakia. Steps in this direction taken by the Government of Lithuania are evaluated positively.

  It is expected that once Latvia and Estonia join the European Union, persons with a "non-citizen" status will be granted the rights to work and he freedom to travel within the EU territory equal to those enjoyed by Latvian and Estonian citizens.

  Clearly, the overall solution of the outlined problems will require time. Nevertheless, given the active EU position it is possible to secure real progress in these directions already in the next few months so that such positive dynamics could progress before the official entry of Latvia and Estonia to the European Union. In the future, as it is stipulated in Article 6 of the PCA, Russia and the EU could cooperate on matters pertaining to the observance of human rights and rights of national minorities in Latvia and Estonia with the aim of encouraging the authorities of these countries to bring the real state of affairs in this field into full compliance with the obligations of the PCA and other known international standards.

Ambassador of the Russian Federation

January 2004

 





 
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