The petition campaign for the Minority SafePack Initiative in the Basque country, coordinated by the Basque Nationalist Party (EAJ-PNV), started with the launch of the Euskara language version of the minority-safepack.eu website and a press conference on December 19th in Bilbao.

"If it collects one million signatures, this European Citizens' Initiative will oblige the European Commission to take a decision on the matter of minorities, because to date, and despite the successive appeals by the European Parliament, it has not adopted any", said MEP Izaskun Bilbao Barandica in her presentation of the Minority SafePack.

„For us, national minorities in Europe and the FUEN, the Basque country is a model in creating a framework which allows language revitalisation, renewal of minority languages and social construction. The participation of Euskara speakers and their associations in the MSPI campaign is a very important element, especially taking into account the cross-border cooperation with the Basque communities in France and also with the region of Navarra. We believe that this cooperation among minorities needs to be built on the social fabric, which is very strong here: the civil society is the basic element of the Basque country”, said FUEN President Loránt Vincze at the press conference held with the participation of over 100 representatives of the Basque civil society.

The motto of the European Union is United in diversity, but in the concept of the EU this diversity refers only to the official languages and the „official” cultures. The official languages don’t need European support, they will survive and they will be strong in their states, without it. The languages of small communities however need all the help they can get from the EU, said the President of the FUEN. The EU should create a general approach to the topic of national minorities; it is not enough for the EU to recognize minority languages and cultures as a value, it ought to also protect this value, he added.

With the Minority SafePack Initiative we started a movement and we will prove to the EU that diversity includes the national minorities, and that their culture and language needs protection, said Loránt Vincze.

Andoni Ortuar, the president of the EAJ-PNV, has also expressed his strong support for the Initiative at the conference, where the Basque language version of the campaign page was presented. László Bodor, the Campaign Manager of the MSPI was also present at the conference.