The issue of legal regulation of languages in Ukraine

Abstract

The article raises the issue of implementing constitutional norms on ensuring the rights of national minorities by Ukraine. It is established that certain provisions of the Law of Ukraine “On Education” dated 05 September 2017 have been criticized both at national and international level as regards termination of curricular programs in languages of national minorities other than EU languages. It is determined that a change in language policy resulted in a conflict of interest in Chernivtsi on 17 October 2017 between representatives of Romanian national minority and representatives of NGOs "Right Sector" and "Freedom" as to the right to study in their native language. It is established that Ukraine, in violation of the international obligations defined by international treaties in the field of protecting the rights of national minorities, including those ratified by Ukraine, did not take into account the relevant recommendations of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, the Venice Commission, the Advisory Committee on the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities, Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, United Nations Monitoring Mission, Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights, UN Special Rapporteur on Minorities.

According to the results of the analysis, it is established that there is no special law determining the spheres of public life and measures to guarantee the rights of national minorities. The respective guarantees for teaching in the mother tongue were not established in the law on the status of the state language dated 25 April 2019.

It is concluded that to resolve this problem, it is necessary to adopt a constitutional law that would determine the procedure for the use of national minority languages. In connection with this, the object of research is Draft Law of Ukraine "On Languages in Ukraine" No. 1103 submitted for consideration to the Verkhovna Rada on 29 August 2019 by V.V. Novynskiy, M.S. Mahomedov and others. Formal-legal, comparative-legal and logical methods are applied.

The content of Part 5 of Article 53 of the Constitution of Ukraine is analyzed, it was concluded that it did not set an alternative, but it sets a mandatory obligation to perform all actions of the state to guarantee the rights of national minorities.

It is concluded that it is necessary to adopt a special law on languages in Ukraine in order to implement the Constitution of Ukraine. It is recommended that the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine include Draft law No. 1103 on the agenda, consider it, and adopt it as a basis in the first reading. It is recommended to adopt laws related to the draft law on national and cultural autonomy, on indigenous peoples of Ukraine, on national minorities (new version), on local referenda, on an all-Ukrainian referendum.