FUEN’s cooperation with UNESCO

Strengthening the cooperation between FUEN and UNESCO in the area of the preservation of the linguistic diversity in Europe and the world – this was the focal point of the discussions at the visit of FUEN‘s European Dialogue Forum and representatives of the member organisation „Unser Land“ from France at the UNESCO headquarters in Paris.
At the discussions on Wednesday, 5 July, language policy, the use of mother tongue and education were identified as fields the organisations could cooperate in.
FUEN president Vincze Loránt pointed out that unfortunately minorities have almost no influence on UNESCO’s work as it is the states who are making the proposals, for example regarding new proposals for the UNESCO'S Intangible Cultural Heritage list, and minority proposals are often disregarded.
FUEN’s work and projects were presented at the meetings, while the UNESCO officials presented the world’s most extensive documentation of linguistic diversity, the World Atlas of Languages, which documents 2000 languages from 122 countries, and their programmes and plans for the International Decade of Indigenous Languages 2022-2032.
Federation of Western Thrace Turks in Europe (ABTTF), Freedom Equality and Peace Party (FEP Party) and Western Thrace Minority Graduates Association (WTMGA) are members of the FUEN. The FEP Party, ABTTF and WTMGA are representing the Muslim Turkish Minority of Western Thrace in Greece.