A/HRC/52/27 2021 and 2022 for the Americas, Africa and the Middle East, Asia and the Pacific, and Europe and Central Asia. In total, 13 regional forums have been held since 2019 with 1,617 participants and 676 recommendations dealing with issues such as minority language rights (2019), hate speech (2020), conflict prevention (2021) and the thirtieth anniversary of the adoption of the Declaration (2022). 21. The regional forums were possible thanks to the coordination of the Tom Lantos Institute and the contributions and assistance of numerous non-governmental organizations, State representatives, and regional and international organizations, such as the Council of Europe, the European Union, OSCE, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization and others. 22. The Forum itself was established in 2007 by the Human Rights Council in its resolution 6/15 and the important role of the Forum reaffirmed in 2012 in Council resolution 19/23. The Forum is mandated to provide a platform for promoting dialogue and cooperation on issues pertaining to national or ethnic, religious and linguistic minorities, and to provide thematic contributions and expertise to the work of the Special Rapporteur. The Special Rapporteur is tasked with guiding the work of the Forum, preparing its annual sessions and reporting to the Council on the Forum’s thematic recommendations. The Forum meets annually in Geneva for two working days, which are allocated to thematic discussions. In recent years, before the pandemic, the Forum was usually attended by more than 600 participants, although that number decreased to approximately 400 in 2020 and 2021, with a hybrid format because of the pandemic. 23. In 2022, however, the fifteenth session of the Forum returned to an in-person format on 1 and 2 December, with participants unable to attend in Geneva having the option of presenting a video intervention. The number of registered participants in 2022 surged to almost pre-COVID-19 levels with 580 participants from 79 countries, an indication of the high level of interest in the Forum itself and the importance of addressing minority issues. The theme in 2022 was, as for the regional forums, the thirtieth anniversary of the adoption of the Declaration: review, rethink, reform. 24. The complete report on the Forum and its recommendations is being presented to the Human Rights Council separately. V. Thematic report: moving forward in recognizing and protecting the rights of minorities at the United Nations A. Introduction 25. In 1992, the Declaration on the Rights of Persons Belonging to National or Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic Minorities was adopted in response to the reconfiguration of the international order following the end of the Cold War, the disintegration of the Soviet Union, and an upsurge in violent conflicts in different parts of the world, in which minority issues often figured prominently. This was during the period that led to the adoption of global and regional instruments and treaties such as the Council of Europe’s Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities and the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages, the creation of the mandate of the OSCE High Commissioner on National Minorities in 1992 as a conflict prevention tool, and in 1993 the adoption of the Copenhagen criteria for countries wishing to join the European Union, which included “stable institutions guaranteeing democracy, the rule of law, human rights and respect for and protection of minorities”. The fate of minorities was at stake 30 years ago, echoing earlier calls made by the United Nations in 1948. It is important to remember that the atrocities committed during the Second World War, against Jewish, Roma and other minorities, which led to the adoption of the first United Nations human rights treaty – on genocide – and the instrumentalization of some minority grievances being used as pretexts for aggression early in the global conflict 5