Austrian minister announces Croatian language classes in schools

“The Austrian Ministry of Education will enable Croatian language classes in Austrian schools instead of the current so-called “BCS” (Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian),” Austrian Foreign Minister Beate Meinl-Reisinger said in Zagreb on Thursday.

In Austria, a 1996 recommendation on non-segregation of children in schools based on ethnicity is in force.

“We have spoken with the Ministry of Education, which will withdraw the recommendation sent in the late 1990s and repeated in the 2000s, and will emphasize the autonomy of schools, which will be enabled to teach in Croatian,” announced the Austrian Minister for Europe and International Affairs Beate Meinl-Reisinger in Zagreb at a joint press conference with her Croatian counterpart Gordan Grlić Radman.

At the beginning of 2024, the Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs announced that the Austrian province of Styria will, from the academic year 2024/25, introduce Croatian as an independent subject of mother tongue teaching in its regular school system.

The MFEP called it a significant step towards resolving the issue of respecting the sovereignty of the Croatian language in Austria, "since at the federal level there is still a scientifically unfounded recommendation from the Federal Ministry of Education, Science and Research from 1996 regarding mother tongue teaching for Bosnian, Croatian and Serbian 'on non-separation according to ethnic affiliation'".

Grlić Radman, who called the minister's announcement on Thursday "great news", said that Croats in Austria, together with Austrians in Croatia, form a "unique bridge for strengthening our overall ties".

“The Croatian minority in Austria, which today numbers 50 thousand Burgenland Croats and numerous Croatian immigrants, plays a special role in our relations,” said Grlić Radman.

He stressed that teaching the Croatian language in the Austrian education system is particularly important for Croats in Austria, and that he discussed with the minister the need to take into account the fact that it is an official language of an EU member state and should not be taught "as part of artificial creations such as BCS (Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian language)".

The 'patient' could leave

Croatia is part of the "Friends of the Western Balkans" initiative, which was launched in 2023 by the then Austrian Foreign Minister Alexander Schallenberg "with the aim of supporting the EU enlargement process".

“The stability and security of the Western Balkans are in the focus of the two countries, and they consider EU enlargement a geostrategic investment in peace, stability and economic growth of the entire continent,” said the Croatian minister, particularly welcoming Albania's progress and Montenegro's European path.

Meinl-Reisinger called the enlargement of the Union a central interest of the bloc and "the most strategically important instrument for strengthening cooperation" and added: "It is in our primary interest to take decisive steps in terms of enlargement because the countries in the region will also benefit from it," highlighting Croatia as the most recent example of a win-win situation.

She stressed that it is important for the countries of the Western Balkans to get "the perspective of membership." She compared the enlargement of the EU to a situation in which patients wait for hours for a doctor who tells them he will come, "but he just has to do something else."

“At some point, that patient will get up and leave. I think the EU must understand that countries are such 'patients' who will at some point run out of patience and leave,” said the Austrian foreign minister, warning that a possible political vacuum could be filled by "powers that are not close to us."

Repatriation of Croatian and Austrian citizens

Grlić Radman also thanked the minister and all Austrian institutions for their assistance and cooperation in the repatriation of Croatian citizens from the Middle East, saying that Austria transported 29 Croatians from Riyadh to Vienna and 17 from Oman, while Croatia transported two Austrian citizens on flights organized by the Croatian government.

The two countries continue to monitor the situation and call for de-escalation in order to prevent the conflict from spilling over to other countries in the region. Grlić Radman, who called Austria one of Croatia's most important economic partners, said that he sees room for expanding cooperation in the areas of energy, infrastructure, defense and innovation.

The two ministers visited JANAF's Žitnjak Terminal earlier on Thursday, and Meinl-Reisinger emphasized that Croatia is a reliable energy hub for this part of Europe.

Source: HRT