Klimkin Plans To Discuss Kiev-Budapest Row With Hungarian Community In Ukraine

Fahad Shabbir (@FahadShabbir) Published October 12, 2018 | 06:01 PM

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin said that he would travel to Uzhgorod on Saturday to take part in a meeting of the Society of Hungarian Culture of Transcarpathia and discuss Kiev's ongoing row with Budapest with Ukrainian Hungarians.

KIEV (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 12th October, 2018) Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin said that he would travel to Uzhgorod on Saturday to take part in a meeting of the Society of Hungarian Culture of Transcarpathia and discuss Kiev's ongoing row with Budapest with Ukrainian Hungarians.

Last week, the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry expelled a Hungarian consul working in the Ukrainian city of Berehove after reports emerged claiming that the consulate had been issuing Hungarian passports to Ukrainians who were ethnic Hungarians. Budapest responded by expelling one of Ukraine's consuls.

"Tomorrow I will be in Uzhgorod. The Society of Hungarian Culture of Transcarpathia has invited me to take part in its meeting ... I am sincerely glad about the upcoming meeting. I like talking eye to eye ... It will be especially important for me to talk to those Ukrainian Hungarians whose interests have been directly affected by the current tensions between Budapest and Kiev. I am ready for a principled conversation with my critics and opponents.

Today I will say the following you have chosen the wrong enemy and the wrong thing to hype yourself about," Klimkin said on Facebook on Friday.

The minister noted that he had started a discussion with Budapest regarding the teaching of the Ukrainian language and condemned the "practice of mass distribution of Hungarian citizenship." Klimkin clarified, however, that he had nothing against the Hungarian community.

According to Klimkin, it is not right to accuse Ukrainian Hungarians with a dual civilian of treason or separatism, and it is necessary to resolve this issue without "bringing harm to people who have already had two passports."

The diplomatic row over suspected dual citizenship is just another development in the months-long standoff between the two countries that was sparked by Ukraine's new education law. The legislation, enacted last September, stripped national minority children of the right to study in their native language.