Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade of Hungary Peter Szijjarto says his country may block the confirmation of the provision of the status of an aspirant country of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) to Ukraine.
He said this in an interview with Ukrainska Pravda, Ukrainian News Agency reports.
"We will see. There are negotiations on the matter in Brussels. We will see where they will lead to. Besides, we will take into consideration results of the next round of talks of the Ukrainian education minister with the Hungarian minority that will start early in July," he said.
The Hungarian minister named three conditions for unblocking the activities of the Ukraine - NATO commission by Hungary.
"The first condition - the transition period on the language of education should be extended to 2023 and you will have to arrive at an agreement with the minority on which specific changes will be introduced. The second condition, which also fully corresponds with the recommendations of the Venice Commission, is the following: the norm on the language of education should not address private schools," he said.
The third condition has been fulfilled - Ukraine has started consultations with representatives of the Hungarian minority.
When asked whether the language norm of the law on education can remain in the current wording the Hungarian minister said the Hungarian minority should decide this.
He says the desire of Ukraine to lessen the influence of Russia and the Russian language should not hit the rights of the Hungarian minority.
"We understand that you have problems in the relations with Russia. We understand that your government and the President [Petro Poroshenko] want to lessen the Russian influence, including through Russian schools. But I have one question: if this concerns the Russian language, how have we Hungarians appeared on this picture? We want to go away from it," he said.
As Ukrainian News Agency earlier reported, on June 22, Ukraine and Hungary discussed possible guarantees of free choice of a language of education at private schools in Ukraine.
Hungary hopes the conflict with Ukraine on the Ukrainian education law will be resolved before the summit of NATO which will take place in July 2018.
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