Prof. Dr. Silvo Deveta is lecturing
Prof. Dr. Silvo Devetak is lecturing in CASS IEA
Seminar on the Rights of Ethnic and Religious Minorities in the EU
Prof. Dr. Silvo Devetak is visiting the Organizing Committee of IUAES 2008
On October 17th, a seminar on the Rights of Ethnic and Religious Minorities in the EU was held in the IEA/CASS. Prof. Dr. Silvo Devetak had a presentation on this topic in Beijing China. Dr. Devetak is Director of the European Centre for Ethnic, Regional and Sociological Studies at the University of Maribor as well as Professor for International Public Law, Head of the Department of International Law and International Relations and President of the Senate of International Post-graduated Studies on Human Rights and the Rights of Minorities at University of Maribor ,Slovenia.
In this meeting, Dr. Devetak pointed out that a great disparity exists between the use of human and minority rights as a tool of EU foreign policy and the political willingness of EU members to adopt their own standards on minority rights. The European standards on minority rights are thus constituted by norms enshrined in international instruments adopted within the Council of Europe or stipulated at bilateral level. A great majority of EU states are members of COE instruments, but some stubbornly refuse accession to these international obligations. Problems regarding inter-ethnic and inter-religious relations, including the status and rights of ethnic minorities, are both a humanitarian and crucial political and security issue of the enlarged EU. Dr. Devetak emphasized that the minority issue must be considered in the context of European identity, which is not clearly defined. The main obstacle to the development of positive EU policies is the hypocrisy of the European states and the lack of their political willingness to improve the European law on minorities’ rights.
There are 13 experts attended this roundtable discussion, including Ms. Anna Karin Friis(Third Secretary, Political Affairs, European Union Delegation of the European Commission in China), Ms. Christile Drulhe (First Secretary, French Embassy in Beijing), CASS Professors WENG Naiqun, LI Biing, WANG Jian’e, JIANG Deshun, ZHANG Jijiao, ZHOU Xuewen, ZHANG Xiaomin, HU Hongyuan and DU Fachun etc. Chinese scholars appreciated Dr. Devetak’s lecture and his research findings, they exchanged views with each other on EU-China minority studies.
Dr. Devetak is chairman of ISCOMET, the International Scientific Conference Minorities for Europe of Tomorrow, a NGO with over 250 members from almost all European countries. ISCOMET has a consultative status with the Council of Europe. Dr. Devetak is also editor in chief of Regional Contact (a journal for regional information and the exchange of experience and ideas in the field of European Regionalism), member of the Advisory Board of INTEREG (Munich) and of the Scientific Council of Regions of Europe (magazine of the Assembly of the European Regions), and of the Association for the Study of Ethnicity and Nationalism - ASEN (London). In 1997 he got the award "Ambassador of Science of the Republic of Slovenia". His bibliography includes about 300 books, scientific articles, surveys, commentaries, studies, reports and other writings on international law, international relations, regionalism, human rights, racial discrimination, and especially on national or ethnic minorities issues. In recent years he had delivered more that 90 lectures to the scientific meetings and universities all over the world (Austria, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, China, Denmark, Estonia, France, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Luxembourg, Poland, Russia, Spain, Switzerland, UK, USA, South Africa, etc.). Dr. Devetak has organized a great number of international scientific meetings and was co-ordinator of a number of international research teams studying inter-ethnic issues and inter-regional co-operation.