The United Nations Forum on Minority Issues holds its seventh session in Geneva on 25-26 November 2014.

Deputy State Secretary for International Cooperation of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade Ádám Zoltán Kovács attended the event and spoke on behalf of Hungary. The aim of the Forum is to provide a platform for the Member States of the United Nations to engage in dialogue and cooperation on the subject of ethnic, religious and linguistic minorities and to extend methodological and specialist assistance to the UN Special Rapporteur on minority issues.

Rita Izsák has occupied this position since 2011. The Forum identifies and analyses best practices, challenges, opportunities and initiatives related to the implementation of the UN Declaration on Minority Rights. Every year since 2008 the Forum has held its two-day sessions on different thematic issues. In this year's session it focused on combatting violence and violent crimes against minorities, and on the examination of related international and regional standards and principles.

The Forum reviewed the transposition and recognition within national legal systems of the relevant international conventions (such as the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide) and principles (such as those of prevention and the responsibility to protect), and practical application of these in government programmes.

In his address, Deputy Secretary of State Kovács emphasised the Hungarian government’s unbroken commitment to minority protection issues, which are given due weight in both its domestic policies and its actions in the field of Foreign Affairs. In the 2005 World Summit Outcome Document, the UN confirmed the protection of minorities as a universal element in the guaranteeing of political and social stability and peace.

(Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade)