RFE/RL NEWSLINE 
Vol. 1, No. 176, 10 December 1997

SLOVAKIA POSTPONES HUNGARIAN VISIT.
Slovakia has postponed a one-day visit by Hungarian Minister
of Defense Gyorgy Keleti, scheduled for 10 December,
Hungarian media reported on the same day. A Defense Ministry
official in Bratislava said the visit would be rescheduled for
early next year. No explanation for the postponement was
offered but the daily "Nepszabadsag," citing anonymous
sources, says Slovak Defense Minister Jan Sitek would like to
host Keleti as lavishly as he was hosted in Budapest during his
visit there earlier this year. This would  have been impossible
with only half a day programmed for the event. Keleti and
Sitek were to sign two treaties, one on confidence building and
the other on the joint use of air space. MS

HUNGARIAN PARLIAMENT APPROVES 1998 BUDGET.
The parliament approved the 1998 budget on 9 December. The
vote was 209 in favor, 65 against, and two abstentions. The
budget provides for a deficit of 419 billion forints ($2.1 billion),
which is 4.4 percent of the GDP, Hungarian media reported.
Economic growth is expected to be 3-4 percent. In separate
news, the parliament elected Arpad Kovacs, chairman of the
board of the State Privatization and Holding Company, as
president of the State Audit Office for a period of 12 years. MSZ


ETHNIC HUNGARIANS SUSPEND PARTICIPATION IN
ROMANIAN  GOVERNMENT... The Hungarian Democratic
Federation of Romania (UDMR) on 10 December announced it
has suspended its participation in Victor Ciorbea's coalition
cabinet, RFE/RL's Bucharest bureau reported. The decision
followed the vote in the Senate on the government regulation
that amended the 1995 Education Law. Representatives of the
National Peasant Party Christian Democratic (PNTCD) voted in
favor of opposition amendments, limiting the teaching of
Romanian language with special manuals for national
minorities to grades I-IV, instead of all school grades, as
provided in the regulations. PNTCD senators also supported an
amendment that forbids separate universities of the national
minorities. They also supported forbidding  separate minority
sections in  existing universities,  which the 1995 law
permitted. The UDMR said this was in breach of a protocol of 3
December, signed before the reshuffle of the cabinet.  MS

 ... AND INTER-ETHNIC TENSION RISES IN
TRANSYLVANIA. Police are guarding an orphanage in the
Transylvanian town of Odorheiul Secuiesc run by Greek-
Catholic nuns and the local government council is threatening
to resign, the media in Romania reported on 9-10 December.
The police were deployed at the orders of government
secretary general Remus Opris, after he visited the town on 10
December. The local council is suspecting that the orphanage
will serve as a means to bring about the "Romanization" of the
town, which is inhabited by Hungarian Szeklers (see "RFE/RL
Endnote, 15 August 1997). Earlier on 10 December, the local
mayor refused to allow a truck that brought furniture to the
orphanage to unload. The locks that were placed at the mayor's
order on the building were dismantled. The UDMR protested
the measure, saying matters should be left to the decision of a
court of justice. MS

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