October 2005

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GEORGIA FINALLY RATIFIES THE FRAMEWORK CONVENTION FOR THE PROTECTION OF NATIONAL MINORITIES

October 2005 - The Georgian Parliament ratified on 13th of October the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities, the first legally binding multilateral instrument addressing the issue of minority rights, including the rights of linguistic minorities. This document was adopted by the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe on 10 November 1994. It was opened for signature on 1 February 1995 and entered into force 1 February 1998. As of 10th October 2005, 37 states out of 46 member states had ratified or acceded to the Convention. Terry Davis, Secretary General of the CoE, had urged Georgia “to make an urgent progress with the ratification of the Convention, which the country promised to ratify at the time of joining the Council of Europe.” The urgency seems understandable considering that Georgia remained one of the few countries that had not yet ratified it.

As regards to linguistic rights, the parties ratifying the Convention undertake to “recognise that every person belonging to a national minority has the right to use freely and without interference his or her minority language, in private and in public, orally and in writing.” It also establishes, amongst other things, “that persons belonging to those minorities have adequate opportunities for being taught the minority language or for receiving instruction in this language” but “without prejudice to the learning of the official language or the teaching in this language.”

However, and in spite of Mr. Gaon’s - the Council of Europe’s Ambassador to Georgia- comments emphasising that “Georgia should ratify the minority convention without declarations as was done by Latvia earlier this year”, Georgia refrained from undertaking a commitment to ensure the conditions which would make it possible to employ minority languages in relations between the representatives of the national minority groups and the administrative authorities in areas predominantly populated by national minorities. The Georgian side also states that it will not be responsible for implementing provisions of the Convention in Abkhazia and South Ossetia, territories with which Georgia is in conflict.

Up to now, Georgia has not signed the European Charter of Regional or Minority Languages.