The most recent report on Romania by the Council of Europe, meant to review Romania’s fulfilment of the commitments taken by ratifying the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages, has been published last week, and assesses the situation of minority languages in Romania, including Hungarian, which is the most widely spoken language in the country after Romanian.
In general, the report welcomes the positive measures taken by the Romanian state since the last reporting cycle, but stresses that there is still a lot to be done, since many of the relevant undertakings have only partially or formally been implemented. The report stresses the need for further action, especially concerning the use of minority languages in judicial proceedings, in relations with administrative authorities and public services, as well as in the field of healthcare and consumer rights.
Regarding the judicial system, the Committee of Experts underlines the “need for the Romanian authorities to encourage minority language speakers to more widely use their languages in judicial proceedings”, both in speech and in writing. In order to achieve this, they recommend – among other things – “the use of interpretation and translations”, in a way that does not incur additional expenses for citizens.
Concerning administrative authorities and public services, the Committee stresses the need to “extend the number of widely-used administrative texts and forms for the population in Hungarian”, while also encouraging the publication of all official documents in Hungarian. In certain domains, like street names, or public transport and tourist signs, the report encourages the use of traditional names in Hungarian in the relevant municipalities. However, the wording of the Report is rather vague, since it fails to specify what it means by “relevant municipality”.
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