The Committee of Experts of the European Charter of Regional or Minority Languages of the Council of Europe, in its new report on Slovenia, acknowledges the efforts undertaken by the authorities of Slovenia to protect the languages spoken in their country, and provides a number of recommendations to strengthen their presence in education, including through teacher training, and in mass media.
In Slovenia, the Hungarian and Italian languages continue to enjoy a relatively high level of protection and measures are taken by the authorities to support the implementation of the existing legal framework. Bilingual education in Hungarian and Slovenian, as well as education in Italian are provided at all levels of education apart from university.
There is a legal basis for an extensive use of Hungarian and Italian, which are official along with Slovenian in certain areas and are used to a certain extent in courts and administration. Together with the Hungarian and Italian national communities, in 2022 Offices for Bilingualism were set up, tasked with supporting and monitoring the use of these languages in public life. This is a development to be welcomed, the committee stresses.
As regards mass media, since 2021 additional funds have been granted to remedy the staff situation for the Hungarian and Italian radio and television programmes. Legal provisions for the use of Hungarian and Italian also exist in the economic sector. Certain shortcomings remain, however, when it comes to the use of these languages in practice.
The report has been published together with comments from the authorities.
