Thousands of Ethnic Hungarians Rally for Autonomy in Romania
Thousands of ethnic Hungarians staged rallies in Romania on Sunday to call for autonomy for the Szeklers' Land, home to most of their minority.
Romanian police said some 15,000 people had taken part in peaceful demonstrations across the country's central Transylvania region, while organizers put the turnout at around 100,000.
The Szeklers are part of Romania's 1.4-million strong minority of ethnic Hungarians. They mostly live in the Transylvanian counties of Covasna and Harghita, where they account for around 80 percent of the population.
Many of Sunday's marchers carried banners reading "We want autonomy, not independence".
"We want to remind the Romanian government that (its) disregard for dialogue and the Szeklers' determination will not force us to give up our struggle for autonomy," Izsak Balazs, president of the Szekler National Council, was quoted as saying by Mediafax news agency.
In Budapest, several thousand demonstrators took to the streets in solidarity, many of the marchers waving Szekler and national Hungarian flags, Agence France Presse reported.
Source: Agence France Presse
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