VIDEO: Rwandan students singing Hungarian folk song in Hungarian

President Katalin Novák met Rwandan counterpart Paul Kagame in Kigali on Sunday to discuss bilateral cooperation in education and water management, among other areas, and she declared after the talks that just as Hungary was the “gateway to the European Union”, Rwanda played the same role on the African continent.

Novák hailed Kagame’s announcement that Rwanda will open a diplomatic mission in Hungary. Her visit, the first by a Hungarian head of state to Rwanda, represented “a milestone” in bilateral ties, she said, adding that Hungary and Rwanda “set an example in cooperation based on mutual respect”. At the meeting, the presidents talked about the importance of peace, and they also signed agreements serving as the foundation of future cooperation.

The Stipendium Hungaricum grant programme related to Rwanda was extended and an agreement on cooperation in nuclear training signed, as was a financing agreement within a 52 million dollar aid loan programme for water management projects. Novák also expressed thanks for her invitation to the Women Deliver 2023 conference, and invited President Kagame to the Budapest Demographic Summit in September. Later on Sunday Novák is scheduled to lay a wreath at the memorial of the 1994 Rwanda genocide before meeting the Archbishop of Kigali, Antoine Kambanda.

Rwandan students singing Hungarian folk song in a school built with the help of Hungary: