The return of the old ghosts? The so-called Beneš Decrees and the European protection of national minorities
Abstrakt
In the fifth monitoring cycle, the Advisory Committee on the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities surprisingly for the first time adressed issues related to the so-called Beneš Decrees, which severely affected the Germand and Hungarian minorities in Czechoslovakia in the period immediately after the Second World War. In light of the Advisory Committee's 2022 Opinion, which invited the Slovak authorities to enter into a dialogue with representativs of the affected national minorities on the possible negative effects of the post-war regulations, this article addresse the substance of the dispute between Slovakia and its Hungarian minority and presents relevant legal aspects in light of current Slovak administrative and judicial practice.
The authors make suggestions on how the recommended dialogue could be used to solve the problem.