In Zakarpattia, nearly 13,000 children are receiving an education in Hungarian across 91 institutions
Dmytro Lubinets (Photo: Ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets / Telegram)
During 2026, the Verkhovna Rada Commissioner for Human Rights received no complaints from representatives of the Hungarian community regarding discrimination, obstruction of the exercise of their rights, or non-compliance with the law on national minorities. This was reported… reported The Ombudsman on Telegram Dmytro Lubinets based on the results of monitoring the observance of the rights of the Hungarian community in Transcarpathia.
Prior to this, Lubinets and his Hungarian counterpart, Imre Juhász, visited Hungarian-language educational institutions in Transcarpathia, where they spoke with students and teachers.
According to Lubinets, during the monitoring process, they observed that the children communicate fluently in both Hungarian and Ukrainian, participate in academic competitions, and win prizes in both languages.
More than 150,000 members of the Hungarian community live in Zakarpattia. In the 2025/2026 academic year, 12,975 children received their education in Hungarian across 91 institutions. Institutions offering Hungarian-language instruction operate in 23 territorial communities.
The Ombudsman noted that the roundtable participants agreed to continue monitoring and responding to issues arising for representatives of the Hungarian community.
During the premiership of Viktor Orbán the issue of the rights of Transcarpathian Hungarians became one of the key issues in political relations between Ukraine and HungaryBudapest demanded that Kyiv make changes regarding the linguistic, educational, and other rights of the Hungarian minority, linking their implementation to support for Ukraine’s EU accession. Due to the stance of the Orbán government, Hungary blocked the progress of Ukraine’s membership negotiations for a long time. Current Prime Minister Péter Magyar claimed to have settled …with Ukraine the issue of the Hungarian national minority in Transcarpathia—something his predecessor Orbán had failed to achieve. In August, the Hungarian government… ruled, that Russia’s conduct places the Hungarian minority in Transcarpathia in serious danger.
New political tensions between Ukraine and Hungary It happened at the end of September. …2026, regarding plans to establish a petroleum product storage facility in Hungary to meet Ukraine’s needs. On September 20, Naftogaz and MOL signed a memorandum to this effect; however, the following day, the Hungarian Prime Minister stated that he would not allow the project to proceed, as the negotiations had taken place without government coordination.
At that same time, Madyar stated, that Hungary would not join the “Carpathian Eight,” and hinted that Budapest had been included without its consent.
At the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry named such statements by Hungary “unjustifiably confrontational”.September 18, Ukraine initiated “Carpathian Eight” summit. The initiative includes Poland, Romania, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Austria, Hungary, and Serbia.
This is a machine translation of the original article in Ukrainian. It may contain errors.