Kosovo's Halo Effect:(Aka. How about those Szeklers?) - PhillyBlog

Mixiboi · #1 (**permalink**) 04-07-2008, 07:05 PM

Lets see, the kosovo independence is really setting off a bomb around the world, first the Tibetans, now these people:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/07/wo...html?th&emc=th

Quote:

A Hungarian minority group is pressing for greater autonomy in a region where its members outnumber Romanians. A new and more radical organization, the Hungarian Civic Party, has risen to challenge the establishment Hungarian party, which has been a member of each coalition government since 1996.

Those who argue that independence for Kosovo has set a bad precedent tend to talk about frozen conflicts outside the European Union — Abkhazia and South Ossetia, in Georgia, and Transnistria in Moldova. But even in the European Union, borders are often arbitrary. Many ethnic minorities, like the Basques and the Roma, remain stateless while others, like the Hungarians in Romania, as well as in Slovakia and Serbia, are still separated from their brethren.

The Hungarian minority here, known as Szeklers, certainly believe their time for independence has arrived and that their proposed semi-autonomous state, Szeklerland, is an impending reality.

Seriously?

Quote:

The Hungarian region, comprising part of Mures County and all of Harghita and Covasna, where Sfantu Gheorghe is the capital, was once a border area of the Hungarian kingdom defended by the Szeklers. After World War I, the Szeklers found themselves smack in the middle of Romania, a few hours drive north through the Carpathian Mountains from Bucharest.

The conclusion of the war is best remembered for the harsh terms imposed on Germany. But the peace agreement signed by Hungary in 1920, the Treaty of Trianon, was arguably even tougher. Hungary lost roughly two-thirds of its territory and population, including one-third of its Hungarian speakers, in the dissolution of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, a loss that to this day is known as the Trianon trauma. (Hungary regained most of its lost territories temporarily during World War II.)

Nowhere is the Hungarian minority larger or more vocal in its demands for greater independence than in Romania. Hungarians make up 1.5 million of Romania’s 22 million people, about half of them Szeklers. Little wonder that Romania, a member of the European Union and the host of the just-completed NATO summit meeting, joined Slovakia, Serbia and Russia in refusing to recognize Kosovo.

Unlike the Kosovars, the Szeklers are asking for autonomy within Romania rather than complete independence, leaving foreign policy and national defense in the hands of the government in Bucharest. Szeklerland would be nearly 4,000 square miles, with just over 800,000 people, three-quarters of them Hungarian.

Crazy stuff going on these days...Just a matter of time before we have to change out maps again:

Click map:

Tannhauser · #2 (**permalink**) 04-07-2008, 07:27 PM

Hope I'm not de-railing your thread, but this is the exact trend that shows how unlikely one world government is. Pretty much every country has some group of folks dedicated to not being part of that country.

And really, if the Skeezlers get their own country, then I should be able to have my own country too. Anything else would be no fair. The U.N. likes the Skeezlers better than me.

Mixiboi · #3 (**permalink**) 04-07-2008, 10:47 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tannhauser

Hope I'm not de-railing your thread, but this is the exact trend that shows how unlikely one world government is. Pretty much every country has some group of folks dedicated to not being part of that country.[/font]

No, your pretty much right. Unifying the world is very difficult, specially when people want to run their own lives.

I mean we are a country built up on that when you are being mistreated by your home country, you break off.

But then it can happen, you just have to make alot of deals and not get caught up in land rights and pride.

Either way we could be looking at the North American Union or the Civil War 2 in the future...

Or aliens can come and make us one united planet.