June 17, 1997

According to a poll conducted by the Bucharest daily Evenimentul Zilei, ethnic Rumanian teachers are against the proposed amendment to the Education Law which would give equal rights to minorities. [MTI (Budapest), 19-17 June, 1997]

In agreement with Cluj leaders of the Orthodox Church, the ultra-nationalist Mayor of Cluj/Kolozsvár Gheorghe Funar launched a new attack against the statue of Hungarian King Matthias proposing to erect a building next to it in the city’s central square. [Népszava (Budapest), June 17, 1997]

The Rumanian Senate adopted a bill which provides that in villages where the Rumanian Orthodox Church has more than one church, with at least one of them having been obtained in 1948 from the then-banned Catholic Church, the Orthodox Church must return the property to its previous owner. Orthodox Church leaders denounced the new law. [Népszabadság (Budapest), 17 July, 1997]

June 9, 1997

The Rumanian and Hungarian Ministers of Education, Virgil Petrescu and Bálint Magyar, signed an agreement on educational equivalency. In the subject of establishing an independent Hungarian-language university, Mr. Petrescu stated that the fate of the Babes-Bolyai University rests entirely on the decision of the school’s Senate. [Magyar Nemzet (Budapest), June 9, 1997]

June 6, 1997

Professor Andrei Pippidi, head of a delegation to Cluj/Kolozsvár from the National Committee for the Protection of Historical Monuments, announced that the main square of the city must be returned to its original condition within three months. He termed the excavations completed until now "unprofessional," and rejected the notion of building of a new edifice on the square — including a church — as sought by the city’s ultra-nationalist Mayor Gheorghe Funar. [Népszabadság (Budapest), June 6, 1997]