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FM: Hungary resolutely supports UN efforts to protect minorities

The foreign minister said Hungary actively protects the rights of its ethnic kin beyond the borders.

The foreign minister has said Hungary resolutely supports the United Nations’ efforts to protect the language rights of indigenous and national minority communities.

After addressing a high-level UN event in New York on Tuesday, Péter Szijjártó, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade, said Hungary actively protects the rights of its ethnic kin beyond the borders.

Minister Szijjártó told MTI that Hungary was a country where the borders of the nation and the country were not the same. “We therefore find it especially important that the UN also acts as a protector of the rights of national minorities and indigenous groups."

"Ethnic Hungarians who live beyond the borders are there not because they have migrated but because they have always lived there,” he said. “It is one of the consequences of history that they now live in the territory of another country and their rights indeed must be protected.”

The minister added that Hungary supports UN efforts to protect national minorities and the country always acts resolutely to protect the rights of ethnic Hungarians.

Language is clearly the most important means of preserving the identity and culture of national minorities, he said. Special attention must be paid to ensure that the language rights of ethnic Hungarian minorities abroad are not violated, he added.

Photo credit: kormany.hu