ABTTF President: “This historical decision from the EP is very important for the protection of national and linguistic minorities living in Europe and is promising for our future. At the next stage, we expect the European Commission to take the legislative steps proposed by the resolution”.
The motion for a resolution supporting the ‘Minority SafePack Initiative’ (MSPI) organized by the Federal Union of European Nationalities’ (FUEN) and ended with 1,123,422 valid votes regarding the protection of Europe’s national and linguistic minorities was adopted in the European Parliament (EP) on 17 December 2020. The decision on MSPI in a vote at the EP Plenary had the support of 524 out of 694 MEPs. Thus, FUEN's European Citizens Initiative was the first to be adopted by a resolution at the EP Plenary.
MEP and FUEN President Loránt Vincze said the following: ‘With today's vote, the European Parliament gave the strongest possible signal for the European Commission to initiate the legislative process based on the proposals of the Minority SafePack Initiative. This is a great victory!’ The legislative proposals in nine areas suggested by MSPI contains measures the EU could take to protect members of national and linguistic minorities and strengthen cultural and linguistic diversity. In this context, some of the proposals introduced by MSPI are as follows: A Council Recommendation for Member States, funding programmes for small language communities, the building of a Language Diversity Centre, and the freedom of service with respect to audio-visual content in minority areas.
With more than 1 million signatures collected for the initiative which was launched by FUEN in 2013, MSPI became the fifth European Citizens Initiative to succeed. Calling on the EU to improve the rights of national and linguistic minorities in Europe and the creation of a minority protection mechanism at the EU level, and to use the tools available to the EU in this regard and to establish a series of legislative actions, MSPI had been presented to the European Commission in an official meeting held in Brussels on 5 February 2020. The decision to support MSPI, which came to the agenda of the EP Plenary in October, was adopted in the EP in a historical success.
Halit Habip Oğlu, President of the Federation of Western Thrace Turks in Europe (ABTTF) made the following statement: “It is a historic achievement that the resolution was adopted by a vote of the vast majority of MEPs at the EP Plenary. I congratulate first and foremost FUEN President and MEP Loránt Vincze and the MSPI Citizens’ Committee in achieving this success. This historical decision from the EP is very important for the protection of national and linguistic minorities living in Europe and is promising for our future. At the next stage, we expect the European Commission to take the legislative steps proposed by the resolution”.
*Image: www.fuen.org
