German foreign minister: German unity would not have been possible without Hungarians

It would have been impossible to restore German unity without the help of Hungarians in 1989, Germany’s foreign minister said on Tuesday in Berlin at the opening of a Hungary-Germany youth forum.

Heiko Maas, referring to the opening up of the Hungarian border thirty years ago on September 10, 1989, said that Hungarians had cleared the path to freedom for escaping East Germans. By opening the border,

“Hungarians punched the first brick out of the Berlin wall”.

This brick, he added, had become the foundation for today’s peaceful Europe based on solidarity.

The minister said that in the climate of today’s problems and disputes, “perhaps we should talk about this more from time to time”. He added that as a German and a European, he paid thanks to Hungarians for their steadfastness in 1989.

Hungarian Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó said at the forum that cooperation between Germany and central Europe “fundamentally determines the future of Europe”.

The events thirty years ago showed that Hungarians and Germans working together is “good for the whole of Europe”, he said.

Europe became stronger, wealthier and more peaceful with the accession of the eastern European states in 2004, and the region has gone on to be the engine of European growth, Szijjártó said. The volume of trade of Germany with the Visegrad Group exceeds German-French trade by 74 percent, he said, adding that cooperation between eastern Europe and Germany is key to European competitiveness and therefore determines the bloc’s position in the world, he said.

He called for European Union enlargement to integrate countries of the Western Balkans.

“Central Europeans, after fighting for our freedom, cast off the shackles of the communist dictatorships,” he said, noting that in 1991 four countries in the region set up the Visegrad Group “to struggle together to eradicate the remnants of dictatorship and strengthen each other in Euro-Atlantic integration.”

“Profound changes are taking place in world politics,” Szijjártó said.

“The global economy is rife with tension, attempts to curtail free trade are gaining ground, security threats are constant in the regions surrounding the European Union,” he said.

“As we face political, economic and security challenges, Hungarians and central Europeans are ready to take part in finding common solutions so that the European Union can be strong once again.”

He said the EU could be strong if its member states were strong. “Weakened nations that are unable to defend themselves, that have strayed far from their cultural and historical religious heritage, and a Europe based on such weakened nations, cannot be strong. We Hungarians are proud to have preserved our identity as one of the oldest states in the region,” he said.