Boosheid in EP over Slowaakse visie op Hongaarse minderheid (en)
EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - The controversial issue of post-WWII property rights and expulsions has again come under the spotlight in the European Parliament as several MEPs reacted angrily to a recent declaration by the Slovak parliament which they see as "discriminatory" for the Hungarian minority in the country.
MEPs in the parliament's committee on civil liberties debated the sensitive issue - known as the Benes decrees - on Monday (5 October) during a general discussion on the "discrimination of national minorities in Europe."
Giving the topic such a general heading was a way of getting around the facts that several MEPs - mainly from left-wing parties - strongly oppose re-opening the debate on the immediate post-WWII period in the EU assembly.
But the vice-chairman of the committee, Hungarian centre-right MEP Kinga Gal targeted Slovakia's recent political signal on the sensitive post-war decrees right at the beginning of the meeting, sparking a series of Slovak and Czech reactions.
The decrees, adopted by a post-war Czechoslovak government and signed by president Edvard Benes in 1945 included laws on expelling and confiscating the property of hundreds of thousands ethnic Germans as well as Hungarians, seen as having collaborated with the Nazis.
Following a debate in Slovakia opened by a centre-right party of the Hungarian minority about a need to review the issue, the Slovak parliament in early September adopted a resolution which confirmed the inviolability of the legal and proprietary consequences of the Benes decrees.
According to Mrs Gal, such a motion could be interpreted as "in a way re-affirming the discrimination" against the Hungarian minority.
She argues that although the resolution did condemn the collective guilt applied in the past against Hungarians, it suggests that discriminatory conditions created by the decrees can no longer be disputed.
The Hungarian deputy noted that the political statement from Slovak MPs represents a "hostile" message to the country's Hungarian minority, representing about 9.5 percent of the population.
"But it's not only this, it's about recent statements which are really offending the minority and have clear discriminatory effect in the everyday life of these ethnicities. So the question is to the [European] Commission whether this is acceptable," said Mrs Gal.
She added that the newly established EU agency on fundamental rights could tackle "this issue" as part of keeping a general eye on the minority policies of the bloc's member states.
But the Hungarian deputy was countered by several Slovak and Czech MEPs who defended Slovakia's performance in the area of minority rights - a matter of careful monitoring by the EU institutions before the country joined the bloc in 2004.
Instead, Slovak centre-left MEP Monika Benova said there were shortcomings in Hungary's minority policy, noting that minorities may not be represented in the top political bodies in Budapest.
Meanwhile Czech centre-right deputy Jan Zahradil argued that a resolution similar to the recent Slovak one on the Benes decrees was passed in 2002 by the Czech parliament.
However, it was not aimed to "reaffirm the collective guilt or violation of human rights" but as a reaction to external pressure from lobby groups pushing for property compensations, Mr Zahradil pointed out.
He added that the debate surrounding the Benes decrees is "all over." "The EU has started many years after and we should not try to win yesterday's battles and wars because this could bring only mutual bitterness and lead us nowhere."
A similar message was expressed by several Social Democrat MEPs, with the German leader of the centre-left group, Martin Schultz, previously stating that the Benes decrees should not be re-opened in the European Parliament.
Back in 2002, the EU legislature issued a legal study into the matter which concluded that it is beyond the bloc's competence.