Organization: UAKOM SAV Banska Bystrica, CSFR
Priority:     normal
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Newsgroups: bit.listserv.slovak-l
Date:         Thu, 12 Nov 1992 08:33:24 MET
From:         KUBASKA@UAKOM.CS
Subject:      Re: Roots of the Slovak-Hungarian Conflict

> Date:          Wed, 11 Nov 1992 16:19:59 PST
> From:          Joe Pannon <pannon@bcsfse.boeing.com>

 Dear Joe:
 I really enjoy the discussion with you. The people like you and
 me are often referred to as nationalists. I'm glad that we are able
 to argue without raising voices. Here are another things I have to
 take the stand against.

> Ukrainians have been also very accomodating to the Hungarians in
> Ruthenia.  Why can't Slovakia approach her Hungarian minority issue the
> same way?

  I things that every country differs from another ones. You can't
  aply any kind of approach to anything automaticaly. The answer to
  your question would have been: Why can't Slovakia approach her
  Hungarian minority issue the same way as Hungary approachs its
  Slovak  minority? I hope you admit that these are wrong questions.

> > Don't forget that the treaty about G says that borders remains into
> > original Main shipping channel and not in the new one. This is the
> > place where Hungary indirectly recognized the borders. There is no
> > other document where Hungary recognizes it's borders with Slovakia.
>
> No, I did not know that.  On the other hand, Variant C wasn't in that
> treaty, so ... ?

  One of the reasons why variant C was chosen is that it doesn't
 contradict the treaty and there is always possibility to swith from
 it to the original G-N project.

>  I also wonder how that treaty between Hungary and CS
> could apply automatically to one between Hungary and Slovakia after Jan.
> 1.  One of the parties to the treaty will no longer exist.

  The treaty would aply to H and S only in case both of them consider
  it to be valid. This is besides the natural condition upon the
  Danube strong argument why the river had to be dammed before Jan.1.

> > The treaty about Gabcikovo is still valid.
> Yes, and the Earth is flat, too.  But even if it was still valid,
>that treaty did not authorize Variant C, did it?

  See above. To refresh the question of the validity: the treaty was
  conciped as "unquitable" (Sorry I don't know exact expression for
  it in lawier's english)

> As to historical precedence, I have already answered that in another
> message.  I don't think Hungarians wanted more from Slovakia, than the
> Slovaks wanted from Czechs.
  Like what?
  The Hungarians treat their right of selfdetermination in Hungary.
  Slovaks and Czechs will treat it in Slovak republic and in Czech re-
  public respectively. I wonder if Slovaks in CR (X00 000 estimated)
  will enjoy higher privileges than Hungarians in SR.

> Knowing how much cozier Tiso was with
> Hitler than Horthy, I wouldn't hold the Vienna Awards too much against
> the Hungarians if I was a Slovak.  Remember also, which of the two
> leaders was executed as a war criminal after the war.

  I have poor knowledge about those issues so that take my comments
  here as one-old-man-said ones. The trial held against f.Tiso was
  not usual one. I have doubt about the justice in this case. Please,
  don't understand it as my faith in Tiso's innocence in moral aspect.
  I just thing that he didn't deserve the death sentence. May be he
  was just man forced to choose the smaller evil from bigger ones.
  But it may sound like hypocricy and I hope that no Hungary nor
  Slovakia sticks to their dark past.

> > Don't you think that there are existing multilateral
> > europian institutions to judge any violation of human rights? If Mr.
> > Antall knows about any violation of human rights in Slovakia he would
> > better inform such institution instead of claiming to be prime
> > minister of slovak citizens.
>
> Oh, please!  What are those European institutions doing for the former
> Yugoslavia?

  Oh please!  Where in Slovakia Slovaks cut the throats of Hungarians
  and vice versa.
  I also think that those institutions were able to stop what is going
  on now in Y if only Y turn to them instead of turning ane against
  another.

> >   Yes some Slovaks have different oppinions. But not those Slovaks
> > that  took part in Slovak goverment and those bound by responsibility.
>
> Well, Meciar sounds like one of those people, but HE IS the government!
> BTW, what was Meciar during the communist era?  Wasn't he also some kind
> of communist official?

  I just wanted to say that no man from HZDS, SNS, SDL,... speaks the
  way about the Jews, for instance, as Mr. Csurka (the second man
  of Magyar Democratic Forum- the larger party in Hungary) did.

> > > What's wrong talking about the ethnic suppression, anyway?
> >
> >  Just the same as to tell lies. Or do you know about any kind of
> > ethnic supression in Slovakia?
>
> Oh brother (or sister)!  Don't you hear enough of that from Duray?  Or
> are his statements not allowed in the Slovak media?  For starters, wasn't
> there enough protest against approval of certain clauses in the new
> Slovak constitution?
  I heard enough of Mr. Duray. But I hear no one things that have to
  be proved to be true or not from him. His statements are allowed in
  Slovak media. The point is that he prefer to lie about the situation
  in S abroad. I would like to hear from you what you don't like about
  those clauses in Slovak constitution.

> If I was a Hungarian in Slovakia, for me probably the most
> objectionable thing would be to be forced to study the official Slovak
> history putting down Hungarians, having to "learn" about historical
> figures of Upper Hungary that they were really Slovak heroes and noble
> men whose names one could hardly recognize any more because of their
> Slovakization by latter day baptizers in Bratislava.

  I hope that there will be no official history as it was in CSSR, but
  history as it is usual in democratic countries. Anyway I must say
  that I didn't mention "puting down hungarians" while studying. I
  always thought that many Hungarians (in the past it meant the poli-
  tical nation of Magyars, Slovaks, Serbs, ...) played positive and
  many of them played negative role for slovak national interests.
  Don't forget that Slovaks were also Hungarians. The whole trouble
  was that some polititians started to think that Slovaks are
  Magyars in 18 century.

> Autonomy within the Slovak state where Hungarians are in majority

 Can you specify closely those areas? Can you specify closely what
 you mean by the word authonomy?

> the Hungarian language also accepted as official language.
  The hungarians are allowed to use their own language in school,
  office, work, churches, courts of justices,..They have their own
  faculty at the U of Nitra, where teachers for hungarian's schools
  are studying.  What do you want more  in this particular issue? You
  can't force all slovaks to learn   magyar language.

> talking about people inhabiting that area for over a 1000 years and
> Slovakia can't look at them the way the US looks at her immigrants.

   This is just the same as to say that Slovaks were here befor the
   Magyars. It is argument of history not the one of policy. Such
   kind of argumentation applied in the policy and its consequences
   you can see in YU.

Marian Kubaska
Banska Bystrica
Czech and Slovak Federal Republic
E-mail: KUBASKA@UAKOM.CS
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