European Parliament backs Mari language rights</tile> <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"> <meta http-equiv="description" content="European Parliament backs Mari language rights"> <meta http-equiv="keywords" content="European,Parliament,backs,Mari,language,rights"> </head> <body> <table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0"> <tr> <td width="10" height="39"> </td> <td width="99%" height="39"> <table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0"> <tr> <td width="16%"><a href="http://inttranews.inttra.net"><img src="http://inttranews.inttra.net/images/inttranews_grey_2.jpg" width="192" height="37" border="0"></a></td> <td width="50%" valign="middle"> <p><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2"><b><font color="#CCCCCC" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="1">KNOW.<br> HOW.</font></b></font> </p> </td> <td width="34%" align="right" valign="top"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="1" color="#666666">19-05-2005</font></td> </tr> </table> </td> </tr> <tr> <td width="10"> </td> <td width="99%" > </td> </tr> <tr> <td width="10"> </td> <td width="99%" > <table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0"> <tr> <td width="100%"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2"> <b>European Parliament backs Mari language rights</b></font> </td> </tr> <tr> <td width="100%"> </td> </tr> <tr> <td width="100%"> <img src="http://inttranews.inttra.net/img_news/img_ZtkLh3JGOuR3Pghp2Y6K_0.jpg" align="left" vspace="5" hspace="5" ><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Tallinn, Estonia (Baltic Times): Last week the European Parliament, led by a group of Estonian, Finnish and Hungarian MEPs, adopted a resolution criticizing Russia for human and minority rights abuses in the Republic of Mari-El, a region east of Moscow that has a large Finno-Ugric population. <br>Reminding Russia of its international obligations to protect minority rights, the Strasbourg-based legislative arm of the EU blasted the country for a range of abuses against the Mari people and their language. <br> <br>For more information, please visit: <br><a href="http://www.baltictimes.com/art.php?art_id=12706 " target="blank">www.baltictimes.com/art.php?art_id=12706 </a> <br></font></td> </tr> </table> </td></tr> </table> <script type="text/javascript"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="<http://pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/show