A/50/514 English Page 4 10. The present report is submitted to the General Assembly in pursuance of resolution 49/192. II. PROMOTION AND PROTECTION BY STATES OF THE RIGHTS OF PERSONS BELONGING TO NATIONAL OR ETHNIC, RELIGIOUS AND LINGUISTIC MINORITIES 11. Fifteen Governments, one specialized agency, one intergovernmental and two non-governmental organizations replied to the request of the Secretary-General to submit contributions to the Centre for Human Rights. The Governments of Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Morocco, the Russian Federation, Spain and Ukraine provided substantive information on the promotion and protection of persons belonging to minorities within their countries. In view of the fact that only a few replies were received and that little substantive information was submitted on the promotion and implementation of the Declaration, it was neither possible to describe the promotion by States of the relevant provisions of the Declaration in detail, nor to provide an accurate representative reflection of the measures taken by the international community as a whole. A. Protection of the existence of persons belonging to minorities 12. The Governments of Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Dominica, Mauritius, Morocco, the Russian Federation and Ukraine recognized the existence of national, ethnic, religious and linguistic minority groups on their respective territories, and mentioned the relevant constitutional and legislative provisions protecting them. In addition, the Russian Federation stated that everyone shall have the right to voluntarily determine and state his national identity on the basis of self-identification, and the Czech Republic provided information on the acquisition by minorities of Czech citizenship. B. Right of minorities to enjoy their own culture 13. In the Russian Federation, a draft law on national and cultural autonomy has been elaborated which confirms the rights of ethnic communities to preserve and develop their cultural and national individuality, in particular, to protect, restore and preserve their age-old cultural and historical environment. In Ukraine, the 1992 Fundamentals of Legislation on the Culture of Ukraine are aimed at the protection of cultures of national minorities living on its territory. There exist 30 Russian and 30 Ukrainian-Russian theatres, one Crimean Tatar theatre in Simferopol, a Hungarian theatre in Beregiv, the Jewish and Romany theatres in Kiev and approximately 2,000 various ethnic amateur performance troupes in Ukraine. The Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic has provided financial support for cultural activities of the Romany minority. The Government of Mauritius has established various funds to preserve and promote the African, Indian and Islamic cultures, and that of the Ilois community. /...