MEP Gyöngyösi: This is the message of the flag with a hole in it

Meeting Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Brussels at the European Parliament’s plenary session, I gifted him with a Hungarian flag with a hole in it. This flag was “created” during the Hungarian revolution in 1956 and it still symbolizes freedom and rising up against tyranny for all Hungarians to this day.

Under Socialism, the persecution or at least the transformation of national symbols was a cornerstone of the policy aimed at breaking people’s spirit and depriving them of their traditions so they could be fully “Sovietized”. 

As a part of this process, Hungary’s coat of arms was superseded: the traditional national coat of arms was replaced by a universal Socialist red star symbol, which was added to the Hungarian flag as well.

One of the key demands of the 1956 revolution was to abolish the Soviet coat of arms. As a result, the first symbolic revolutionary act was to immediately “enact” this demand by cutting out the foreign occupiers’ symbol from the Hungarian national banner. Freed from the red star emblem, the flag with a hole became the symbol of the free Hungary standing up against barbarian tyranny. It became world famous.
No wonder there is only one other, also a former Socialist country that had a hole in its flag at one point: in 1989, the flag with a hole once again became a symbol of rising up against a Communist dictatorship in Romania, but that’s a story for another time.

By now, Putin’s Russia has got to the point where it increasingly considers the decades of Communist terror as its role model. 

The larger Russian cities see Stalin statues and Communist memorials growing out of the ground. This is the same Russia that attacked Ukraine nearly a year ago. If you ask me why Viktor Orbán, who consistently voices a national rhetoric and often poses as a freedom fighter, so openly supports Russia as it falls back into Stalinist nostalgia and commits an aggression against Ukraine, it’s a mystery to me. 

By doing so, Orbán goes against Hungary’s national interest and the legacy of 1956 for sure. 

Today’s Ukraine is fighting against an anti-human ideology, just like Hungary was in 1956. The similarities don’t end there: Ukraine also hopes for aid from the West, just like we did back then. Fortunately, there seems to be a big difference, too: unlike in 1956, Europe heard the cry for help, decided to stand up for its own interest and support Ukraine in its struggle for freedom.

Disclaimer: the sole liability for the opinions stated rests with the author(s). These opinions do not necessarily reflect the official position of the European Parliament.

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