Bucharest / Romania (RNC Agency) 26.05.1997

The Council of Europe's parliamentary assembly on Monday hailed Romania's progress in the treatment of ethnic minorities since centrists took power in polls last November. "We see signs of more toleration and a more favourable approach on minorities since the new government has taken charge," Finnish MP Gunnar Jansson, chairman of the Council of Europe's Legal and Human Rights Committee, told journalists. Jansson is a member of a 250-strong delegation of Council MPs attending a three-day session in Buchares t on legal, political and economic affairs. Assembly debates on Monday tackled human rights issues including minority rights, setting up a European model penal code and protecting human rights in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Jansson said Romania fulfilled the m ost important requirements as a member-state but the council still recommended it do more to counter racism and xenophobia. As he spoke, some 100 Roma protested in central Bucharest against a 1995 government decision which recommended the use of "Tigan" ( Gypsy) instead of "Roma" in official references to their minority. "Calling us Tigan and not Roma is a first step to racism," said Nicolae Gheorghe, a leader of the Balkan country's Roma community, which he puts at over two million, far more than the off ic ial 400,000 recorded in a 1991census. Gheorghe said that the term "Tigan" was used pejoratively in newspapers, police documents and public life. But on Monday Jansson hailed recent moves by the new centrist coalition government to set up a special commi ssi on on Roma issues as a sign of improvement. The ruling coalition which ousted ex-communists in general elections last year invited representatives of the country's 1.6 million strong Hungarian minority to join the government. As a result, the Council o f Europe voted last month to terminate human rights monitoring in Romania, and gave the country one year to review its treatment of homosexuals, jail conditions, care of abandoned children and handling of land and house restitution cases.The 40-member coun cil was formed in 1949 to work for European unity by strengthening democracy, protecting human rights and promoting European culture. Romania became a full member in 1993 when it pledged to improve its democratic record.