Justice for Europe! – 1st Attachment

 

The Declaration of the VII Hungarian World Congress

on the Right of the Self-determination of the Hungarian People

 

The VII Hungarian World Congress, moved by its responsibility for the fate of Hungarians, as a timely and undeniable step, raises and  initiates the

                                          

                                                 solution to the HUNGARIAN QUESTION

 

     The indigenous Hungarian Nation in the Carpathian Basin, is in a grave spiritual and moral crisis, encompassing all areas of the life of the society.

     This crisis is aggravated by the evil conditions and the hopeless situation of our compatriots, torn apart in the Carpathian Basin, living as second class citizens, who, after 18 years of the renewed Europe, are still afflicted with discrimination and increasingly exposed to the aggressive nationalism of the neighboring states.

     Neither the Hungarian State, nor the European Union demonstrates any endeavor offering hope for the solution of these painful questions. The series of lost historical opportunities leads us to believe that there is no longer any reason to hope.   We must, without delay, take the necessary steps to rectify this situation. 

     The basic means for the solution of the Hungarian Question is self-determination, based on the concepts of liberty and equality, which is the natural and inalienable right of all nations, and has been a basic and binding basic  right  since 1977, when it was adopted by the General Assembly of the United Nations.  

     

    Hereby we declare the claim for the self-determination of the Hungarian Nation!

 

Our demands:

 

1.       The declared right of self-determination must be incorporated into the Hungarian Constitution, and a new national strategy must be developed for the implementation of the right of self-determination.

2.       The supreme means for enforcement of the right of self-determination is the plebiscite,

which expresses the will of the people.  We expect that the Hungarian Government will provide all necessary support for the organization of plebiscites and the creation of the essential conditions for the enforcement of the right of self-determination. The Government should represent the expressed will of the people at all relevant forums and most emphatically at the United Nations Organization.

3.       In the process of Hungarian self-determination – which should take place according to the right of self-determination due to every nation – the Hungarian Government should offer a protected status to the Hungarian ethnic communities, living in annexed territories in the Carpathian Basin.

 

 

    We call upon the Parliament in Budapest, the Hungarian Government and all political powers, to undertake the realization of the demands that are included in our declaration.

     We call upon the Churches, civil and business organizations and public figures, asking them, with their influence, to support the initiative of the World Congress.

     We call upon all Hungarians to be our partners in this struggle and, without fear, to fight with resolution for the right of self-determination, which is due to all free nations. 

     Finally, we call upon the representatives of all written and electronic media to report the Declaration of the VII Hungarian World Congress, thereby helping to arouse the attention of the international public to the so-far unfulfilled basic right of the Hungarian People.

 

     20 August 2008

                                                                                                     VII World Congress of Hungarians

 

Attached: With Extended Hand

                Legal Background    

 

With Extended Hand

Attachment to the Declaration

 

Hungarians in the Carpathian Basin speak to the Nations of Europe

 

For ninety years, Hungarians beyond the present borders have had to suffer countless injustices. As a result of the Treaty of Trianon (1920) and the Treaty of Paris (1947), one-third of the ethnic Hungarian population was placed, unasked and without their agreement, under the authority of foreign states. These peace-treaties were actually dictates; the minority-protection agreements attached to them could not provide in practice, for the citizens of Hungarian nationality, the rights that were due to them.

 

Today, among the peoples of historically and traditionally formed states in Eastern and Central Europe,, only the Hungarians have had to bear an unfair and grave fate, imposed upon them at the beginning of the 20th century. The time has arrived to change this obviously unjust situation, since International Law has made possible the self-determination of peoples. While the Estonians, Latvians, Lithuanians, Slovenians, Croatians, Bosnians, Montenegrins, and Albanians in Kosovo won freedom and independence, based upon this right of self-determination, until now the Hungarians could not even achieve autonomy.

 

The Continent has not yet become the territory of „freedom, law and security” since the European Union, to this day, has not assured the necessary conditions, the collective rights, or self-determination in this respect.

 

The peace and security of Europe cannot be guaranteed in the long run, with the denial of the basic rights of one people, therefore the VII Hungarian World Congress ruled that, in order to settle this question, it would issue a declaration, and it would initiate forthwith the restoration of self-determination for Hungarians in the Carpathian Basin, which would secure their peaceful co-existence and survival.

 

For this solution, it offers as an example Francesco Cossiga, the former Italian President and Minister of the Interior, who, in his address to the Italian Senate, demanded a plebiscite in South Tyrol „because the right of self-determination cannot be denied to the people of South-Tyrol”.

 

Under these circumstances, we also address the people and governments of the Ukraine, Romania, Serbia, Croatia and Austria: WE HAVE A COMMON FATE. Your future as well as ours, will be happy and prosperous, only if you live with us as equal partners, with mutual trust.

 

Our commitment is strong; we believe that our efforts will be crowned with success and, like our neighbors, we will also be able to command our fate.

 

Legal Background

Attachment to the Declaration

 

     The right of self-determination – as a natural right – is the basis of all other rights of freedom. It is reinforced by countless decisions of the UNO, the European Council and the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE). The right of self-determination became a recorded international right, when the Document for the International Agreement on Civil and Political Rights and the Document for the Agreement on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights  were adopted by the UNO Assembly in 1976.*

     The First Clause of these documents states: „Every people has the right for self-determination. According to this right, peoples may freely choose their political system, and freely assure their economic, social and cultural development.”

     This right has a binding force – jus cogens –  which means that this right not only must be kept but this right cannot be given up either. All treaties which break this right are null and void.

 

     The situation of Hungarians in the Carpathian Basin is, for several reasons, not only unjust but also unlawful.

 

·         Wherever new borders are drawn without a plebiscite, the basic law of self-determination is violated. (For this reason, the USA did not ratify the Treaty of Trianon.)

·         The principle of pacta sunt servand cannot be applied either because, owing to the lack of negotiations, it was not a treaty but a dictate.

·         The 52nd paragraph of the International Treaty, signed in Vienna on  May 23, 1969, states that: all treaties are null and void, which came into existence by the threat of or the use of force, or which were made by a breach of the basic concepts of international law, described in the Basic Document of the UNO.

 

Hungarians in the Carpathian Basin agree with the authoritative principle of the UNO, which states that historical solidarity, historical and cultural unity and continuity should be the standard. 

 

The right to self-determination is based upon the will of the people.

 

The will of the people must be established by official or interior plebiscite and it should be declared. Whatever is the final outcome of a plebiscite, it should not endanger the existing equilibrium, since all neighboring countries are either already EU-member states, or intend to join the European Community.