The aim of the article is to analyze the current state of ensuring the rights of national minorities and indigenous peoples in Ukraine, to identify existing challenges and gaps in legal practice, and to provide recommendations for improving the state’s ethno-national policy in accordance with European standards. Particular attention is given to a field study that reveals the perspectives of minority representatives on the effectiveness of legal protection during wartime.

The article examines the current legal regulation and practical implementation of the rights of national minorities in Ukraine in light of the country’s obligations as a candidate for EU membership.

The authors analyze the demographic situation of national minorities, outline the main changes caused by the armed aggression of the Russian Federation, and explore key aspects of the reform of Ukrainian legislation in the areas of ethno-policy, language, and education. Special attention is paid to a field study conducted among representatives of national communities, which helped identify current challenges, effective practices, and expectations regarding the implementation of the Law of Ukraine “On National Minorities (Communities)”. The article aims to formulate recommendations for improving the institutional mechanism for protecting minority rights in accordance with European standards.

It is concluded that there is a need to distinguish between academic and official doctrines of subjects based on ethnicity into those that have their own statehood and indigenous peoples that have historically formed on Ukrainian lands and do not have their own state formations outside Ukraine.

Such a “divide” is extremely important for understanding the level of protection of the rights and interests of the relevant groups: it is the rights of indigenous peoples that must be protected to the maximum extent possible, as this is the only way to preserve their national identity. At the same time, the “issue of the Russian language” should be considered separately, taking into account that it is not about protecting the ethnic Russian minority, but about a certain reaction to the efforts of the Ukrainian national authorities to ensure the status of the Ukrainian language as the state language in a situation where the Russian language has been imposed as the mandatory means of communication for the Ukrainian population for over 60 years.

Bibliography

Newspaper articles

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2. Ombudsman of Ukraine. Research National minorities (communities) and indigenous peoples under occupation: the struggle for survival (2023) (accessed 07.08.2025).

3. Monitorynhove doslidzhennia shchodo zadovolennia osvitnikh potreb natsionalnykh menshyn u zakladakh osvity: Informatsiino-analitychni materialy (Ministerstvo osvity i nauky Ukrainy, DNU “Instytut osvitnoi analityky”) (accessed 07.08.2025) (in Ukrainian).