DECLARATION Of "The Institute of National Remembrance" on the Language, National Self-Identity and Self-Determination

In its thousand-year history the human race has changed greatly - from different populations, tribes, ethnic groups to bigger communities, nations and states. This process is still continuing. Having felt the breath of freedom, more and more nations desire to show their national distinction. They also desire to self-identify, to preserve their culture, traditions and customs and, in this way, to provide themselves with a reliable place in history.

But being full of contradictions, our time engenders quite opposite occurrences, and it is not a rare case when we see that well-developed languages and rich national cultures begin to vegetate and perish. When a nation loses its independence, it loses its freedom. The last-centuries history of the Belarusian nation is a good and vivid example of this phenomenon. 

1. STATEMENT

The humanity is not interested in losing the Belarusian nation from the historical scene, because the loss of cultural heritage and variety, unification and globalization lead to monotony, inexpressiveness, dullness and mean degradation of different nations and the whole human race.

Any national culture "is common wealth to all mankind, it is a source of prosperity; as a result of human activity it renews and enriches itself all the time. But the language is one of the most valuable human treasures. It is not only a medium of communication, it is a great space of meanings..." These words from the General Declaration of the UNESCO on cultural variety (Article 1) were quoted by Koitiro Matsuura, General Director of the UNESCO, at the International Symposium in Minsk (July 9, 2009).

After the disintegration of the Soviet Union, the Republic of Belarus was established on the ideological base of the Belarusian People's Republic and the medieval historical heritage of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.

Before the state was proclaimed there had been three centuries of hidden or open dependence on Poland, Russia and the USSR. The process of neglecting the mother tongue and native culture came to us from the historic past, and unfortunately the majority of Belarusian people do not consider this fact as our national drama. The official leaders of the new state, who lack a sense of national self-consciousness, made everything possible to use the situation and declared Russian, the language of the neighbouring state, the second official language in the Republic of Belarus. As a result, Russian became dominant, and makes the Belarusian language and culture suffer from various obstacles.

Today, the Belarusian language catastrophically loses its status as the language of the titular nation. The UNESCO has already entered it in the list of vanishing languages. In the whole country no Belarusian-oriented kindergarten can be found. There are neither city schools nor higher educational institutions where the titular language is used for teaching different subjects and lecturing. The publications of the only newspaper for Belarusian teenagers "Ranitsa" (Morning) and the magazine "Byarozka" (Birch) were stopped. Before the festival "Dazhynki" 2011 (End of Harvest) the cinema in the town Maladzechna was renamed from Belarusian "Radzima" (Motherland) into Russian "Rodina". The new Central Bus Station in Minsk is full of Russian notices and signs. The national identity of the people and the nation are lost. All this develops into the loss of cultural traditions and feelings of patriotism, causes a constant emigration of talented people, destroys the gene pool and spiritual values. As a result, all these things cause serious danger to the independence of the Republic of Belarus.

When the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Belarus realized this evil process, it demanded by its Decree №П-91/2003 to correct the regulations of the earlier taken laws on languages with the aim "to reach the real equality of the two official languages in practice". The government of the country, however, ignored this demand of the Constitutional Court.

After the mass action organized by the Civil Initiative "Institute of National Remembrance" (CI INR) in 2009, it was revealed that people of different social groups, state officials of legislative and administrative bodies, academic scientists, creative intellectuals treated the problem of the mother tongue with understanding ("Narodnaya Volya", 2009, June 6; 2010, May 18, 21; the collection by V. Yakavenka "The Ghost of Shanghai over the Svislach River", 2011, p.p. 67,79). But many of them do not dare to use their titular language, to say nothing of attempts to defend it, because the higher authorities express disapproval. "How terrible! - was the reaction of Iryna Prylishch, Russian- born who continued speaking good Belarusian: - Our society is forged by fear even in doing such a harmless thing as using the native language!"("Narodnaya Volya, 2009, August 25).

In 2009 in answer to measures of citizens the National Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Belarus prepared several recommendations for the government, and some law-makers, among them the Council of the Republic and the House of Representatives of the National Assembly of the Republic of Belarus planned to prepare and adopt a law in 2010 which would eliminate the distortion in the usage of languages. But during the discussion of the law-making process the President's administration cut out this paragraph from the draft of both state law-making Chambers.

Shortly before the presidential elections of 2010 there happened an unusual event: the All-Belarusian National Assembly clearly expressed its support of the mother tongue. The 2.5-thousand audience broke into applause, when Nina Savinava, Belarusian-born Estonian with a feeling of national awareness and honour, spoke about the necessity of reviving the mother tongue in sovereign Belarus. There was no one who could object to her words. But the pro-president newspaper "Sovetskaya Belorussia" ignored the ardent words of Nina Savinava about the fate of the Belarusian language in its report later.

At the press-conference with journalists (late 2009) the leader of independent Belarus explained the unenviable situation of the titular language, about which Belarusians, are still concerned, by definite international agreements, similar to those on gas and oil. And the agreements are to be fulfilled! "You see, if you receive assistance and some terms are made, then be so kind to follow the rules..." he said in Russian ("Narodnaya Volya", 2010, February 20). From this comes the following: the national language on the imperial market is just a merchandize!

A specific situation of the Russian Federation in international policy was fully disclosed by the well-known Russian TV journalist Siargei Darenka in his interview for the newspaper "Narodnaya Volya". He said: "Russia, you should understand, conceptually does not consider Belarus as an independent area. We, Russians, view the world in a different way. In our opinion, we border not on Belarus, but on Germany. Between us there are some bordering states, areas, which are occupied by one or another country. We cannot consider them as subjects - this is just a structure of our mind. Between us and Germany there is always someone, but this...sort of stop-gap inconvenience" ("Narodnaya Volya", 2009, August 11).

The quoted words are an example of great-power chauvinistic ideas and aspirations which characterize not only this unduly familiar oracle - the bright Russian intellectual, but also many people among the leaders of Russia, who take part in trading Belarus. Meanwhile, the fact that Belarusians have given up their language willingly is a great and impudent lie. The mankurts in power (ideal slaves with no will and infinitely devoted to their owners), people who lost their memory of ancestors and Motherland, officials who are guided by the state administration, force our people to renounce their native Belarusian language!

In 2011 in press and internet sites appeared some publications which are to be called symbolic, because they have some reasonable and principal opinions of simple representatives from different ethnic groups, for instance Russians, Jews, Belarusians. Their authors as well as the mentioned Russian woman Iryna Prylishch write with anxiety, even with anger about the situation of the Belarusian language. Sometimes, as they write, everything looks cynical: Belarusian-oriented schools are opened in other countries, but in Belarus they are closed. Instead appear schools of other ethnic groups! The authors appeal to Belarusians to come to their senses and get back the thing which was taken away from them insolently by swindlers.

2. CONCLUDING PART

Taking into consideration all the above-mentioned circumstances and statements of different people alongside personal observations of participants at the discussion of the topical problem, give the "Institute of National Remembrance" the ground to adopt as a declaration the following principles and regulations on the usage of the native language and preserving the national identity of the Belarusian ethnos and state:

1. The titular Belarusian language and national self-identity shall be considered inseparable in our Motherland. Therefore, when the nation wants to preserve its name and survive, it ought to protect, learn and use the native language.
2. Being the source of patriotism, the titular language of a country enriches the people spiritually. It shall serve as a reliable guarantee and defender of the country's sovereignty.
3. Our language shall be a value, recognized all over the world. It is the language that unites people, connects them with ancestors, forms their mentality and character. Besides it expresses various shades and nuances of events and things, meanings and ideas, which characterize only this particular ethnic group or nation.
4. Languages of various countries and people have many differences, but together, they form the linguistic inflorescence of civilization and enrich cultures. The loss of any language makes the world poorer and destroys a definite ethnic group or a nation. We have no right to lose our mother tongue.
5. The value of some nations and ethnic groups is proved by different international documents, including the General Declaration of the UNESCO on cultural variety and the European Charter of regional and minority languages adopted by the Council of Europe. To ignore these documents and the law of development means to throw Belarus back to the backyard of cultural life on the planet and in human history.
6. An independent country ought to have a stable and all-round system of teaching and instructing in the titular language of the nation - from kindergartens to higher educational institutions. Therefore, the appeal of the CI INR (July 6, 2009) to the leader of the country (including questions to the state officials of legislative and executive bodies, ministers and all citizens of Belarus) is still relevant and important.
7. The leaders of the country, as well as the officials of legislative and executive bodies who do not provide necessary conditions and means for teaching and studying the titular language of the country (on all levels), and those who do not favour its usage in communication, violate the Constitution of the Republic of Belarus and betray the interests of their people. These persons ought to be treated as state criminals.
8. Diasporas of neighbouring countries, founded in the independent Republic of Belarus, are to be proud of the duty to support the titular nation's language, especially in cases when they have opened (or going to open) schools where languages of ethnic minorities will be languages of instruction.
9. In the country, which has problems with national self-consciousness and is concerned about a better status of the titular language, the public and social organizations ought to become more active; definite state measures ought to be taken, and first of all, favourable conditions ought to be provided for the work of the associations The Francis Skaryna Belarusian Language Society, The Belarusian School Society and others..
10. The policy of the state ought to be oriented to preserving, defending and developing real national values and, primarily, the language, which makes every personality a conscious patriot of his country, mobilizes his spiritual and creative power for noble actions and deeds.

All the items of the present Declaration include opinions, ideas and aims of many participants and new friends of the public action of 2009 organized in defense of the Belarusian language.