Despite international sanctions, the framework for developing Hungarian-Iranian economic cooperation is in place, Péter Szijjártó, Hungary’s minister of foreign affairs and trade, said on Thursday.
Although the global situation is complicated and punitive measures against Iran are still in force, there are several promising fields of cooperation, the minister told a session of the bilateral economic mixed committee. Hungarian products and services are competitive in the global market, with Hungary producing the tenth highest export-to-GDP ratio in the world, he said.
Szijjártó was accompanied by CEOs of seven companies involved in agriculture, food industry, water management, health and energy industry, during the visit.
The minister said that all conditions for developing inter-company cooperation were in place.
Bilateral relations are free of political disputes, he said, adding that Hungary’s parliament had ratified the bilateral investment protection agreement earlier this week and the two countries concluded a customs agreement to eliminate administrative trade barriers.
Hungary and Iran have agreed to recognise one another’s immunity certificates,
Szijjártó said. At present over 2,000 Iranian students are studying at Hungarian universities and colleges, the minister said. Szijjártó said Hungary highly appreciated Iran’s role in helping to curb the waves of Afghan refugees.
Hungarian and Russian Christians plan to launch joint projects to support the education of Christians in Syria, Tristan Azbej, the state secretary responsible for aiding persecuted Christians, said after talks with Archimandrite Philaret, Vice-Chairman of the Foreign Church Relations of the Moscow Patriarchate.
Azbej said the meeting had been organised as a result of a October 2019 Hungary-Russia summit, where Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and Russian President Vladimir Putin decided in the presence of Syrian church leaders that Hungary and Russia would cooperate to aid Syrian Christians.
He added that he had agreed with Archimandrite Philaret on the join preparation of projects. Several schools have been destroyed in the civil war in Syria going back more than a decade, and many teenagers had no chance of receiving any form of education, he said.
“Local churches fulfil a significant social mission, and Hungary, as ever, plans to support the Christian communities in these efforts in cooperation with Russian partners,”
he said.
Azbej said he had received an award from Sergei Stepashin, head of the Imperial Orthodox Palestine Society and a former prime minister of Russia, and the Middle Cross from Vyacheslav Ostapchuk, head of the Orthodox Russia All-Russia Social Movement. Azbej added that this was in recognition of the Hungarian government and people’s efforts to support persecuted Christians and protect their interests. Stepashin expressed appreciation to Hungary for uniquely supporting the matter at government level, Azbej added.
Europe’s interest in preventing mass migration waves from Afghanistan has made Iran a key ally in the region, Hungary’s foreign minister, said in Tehran on Thursday.
If mass migration waves from Afghanistan cannot be prevented, they should at least be prevented from reaching Europe, Péter Szijjártó told a press conference held with Hossein Amirabdollahian, his Iranian counterpart, adding that this made Iran’s role in the region more important.
Iran took in more than 3.5 million Afghan refugees by the end of 2020, Szijjártó noted, citing estimates from the United Nations indicating that it could admit some 300,000 more.
“It is clear that if these people set off towards Europe, we will be presented with serious security and epidemiological risks,” the minister said.
Hungary has delivered 100,000 doses of the Sinopharm Covid jab to Iran with a view to increasing the vaccination rate of the country’s Afghan refugees.
As regards the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, Szijjarto said Hungary backed any proposal aimed at reviving it. “In our view the world is dealing with enough challenges as it is, so it is all the more important to have a chance to end certain conflicts,” he said, adding that the world would be a safer place if the West could rebuild its ties with Iran.
Until then, Hungary is prepared to seek the closest possible cooperation with Iran in the areas not affected by the sanctions, Szijjártó said. Amirabdollahian thanked Hungary for the vaccines and welcomed the new agreement on the two countries’ mutual recognition of each other’s Covid immunity certificates.
Tehran is working to reach similar agreements with other countries, too, and to ensure wider approval for the Iran-developed jab,
he said.
Szijjártó is scheduled to hold talks with Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi and the country’s economy minister later on Thursday.
Hungary has reached an agreement with Iran on the mutual recognition of each other’s Covid immunity certificates, Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó said in Tehran on Thursday.
Under the deal, Hungarian citizens who have been inoculated against Covid-19 can enter Iran without restrictions from Friday irrespective of which vaccine they received, Szijjártó told a joint press conference with Hossein Amirabdollahian, his Iranian counterpart.
Hungary has now reached agreements on mutual recognition of Covid immunity certificates with 27 countries.
Before their press conference, Szijjártó and Amirabdollahian signed agreements on cooperation between their customs authorities, in diplomatic education, culture and the Stipendium Hungaricum scholarship programme, the ministry said. Under this scheme, Hungary will offer scholarships to
100 Iranian university students a year,
Szijjártó said, adding that there are an additional 2,000 Iranian students pursuing studies in Hungary.
He also noted that Hungary’s parliament on Tuesday ratified a bilateral investment protection agreement aimed at boosting cooperation between Hungarian and Iranian businesses.
Szijjártó is scheduled to hold talks with Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi and the country’s economy minister later on Thursday.
The European Union should launch a comprehensive financial and technical programme to support the North African and Mideastern countries in defending their borders, Péter Szijjártó, Hungary’s minister of foreign affairs and trade, said in Barcelona on Monday.
Addressing a regional forum of the Union for the Mediterranean (UfM), Szijjarto said he expected growing migration pressure from the southern regions of Africa.
“While Europe is facing several simultaneous challenges, more and more migrants arrive in the continent, already from three directions,” he said.
The position of the Hungarian government has remained unchanged, Szijjarto said. Rather than encouraged to leave their country, those in need should be assisted by eliminating the root causes of migration in their homeland, he said.
Europe should aim to halt migration as far as possible from its borders, for which effective cooperation with the North African nations is indispensable, Szijjártó said.
“It is not an exaggeration to say that the EU’s security starts with the security and stability of North Africa,” he said.
As the issue is crucial, the EU “should free its financial support from all artificial political preconditions,” the minister said, referring to Egypt, which halted migration over the past five years but had no access to EU funds for “certain human rights issues”.
Szijjártó called for discontinuing support for NGOs involved in the maritime transport of immigrants,
saying that their actions undermine the partner countries’ efforts to defend their borders.
Early autumn, the whole western world was shocked by the consequences of the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan as well as the Taliban’s extremely fast offensive and takeover. However, history goes on; we don’t have much time to contemplate how we should relate to the new Kabul leadership, unless we want to make the same mistake again and cause an even bigger disaster by our indecision.
Since September, Afghanistan’s territory has undoubtedly been controlled by a Kabul-based interim Taliban government that exercises the power in terms of public administration (or, the government controls the country at least as much as the previous leadership did). No matter how irritating that may be for us in the West, facts are facts nonetheless. On the other hand, the Taliban’s current interim government is struggling with huge difficulties, which may push the long suffering country into an even more hopeless situation.
Afghanistan is ravaged by an increasingly grave economic crisis and famine compounded by the coming winter.
Current estimates suggest that half of the country’s population, i.e., 23 million Afghans are at the direct risk of not having anything to eat. The Taliban’s desperate situation may undoubtedly spur the government to minimize its costs and focus on keeping up the operation of one thing: the army.
On the other hand, the Taliban clearly has serious challengers such as the Islamic State and Al-Qaeda, who have constantly been trying to undermine the Taliban’s attempts to consolidate its power. The number of their supporters can be further increased by the Kabul government’s impotence and the deepening crisis.
The West is now facing a huge dilemma.
The Taliban has certainly been conducting such policy and employing such methods that are totally unacceptable for us, but they don’t seem to export their system outside of Afghanistan, and are willing to develop contacts with the international community. In contrast, they are confronted by such organizations that refuse to do even this bare minimum and openly want to engage the West in a never-ending fight.
The question is: what can the world do in this situation?
Will we abandon Afghanistan because the Taliban are unacceptable, thus risking famine, an intensifying crisis, mass migration and the growth of terrorist groups that are a direct threat to us? Or will we wait until China, which also has its interests in the region, intervenes and collects the profit offered by the potential reopening of the commercial routes and the investment opportunities, taking a strategic step towards Central Asia? Or will we be able to find some agreement with the most affected Central Asian countries, which are already looking to develop contacts with the interim Taliban government because Afghanistan’s stability is vital for them?
Time is running out and the West must give a clear answer. Otherwise we will surely lose.
A global community of more than 300 library and information professionals from the region and around the world have reinforced their commitment to sharing ideas and expertise to learn from one another and to advance libraries to serve societies better at the 8th Sharjah International Library Conference (SILC), which opened Wednesday, November 10, on the sidelines of the 40th Sharjah International Book Fair (SIBF) at Expo Centre Sharjah.
Organised by the Sharjah Book Authority (SBA), in collaboration with the American Library Association (ALA), the two-day annual conference is fostering the professional excellence of participants through insightful discussions on new trends and technologies and exploring ways to enhance resources and services to support learning, literacy, and education to shape creative and innovative societies.
The conference also addressed the ongoing challenges facing libraries worldwide and served as a networking platform for participants.
The 8th edition of SILC opened in the presence of HE Ahmed bin Rakkad Al Ameri, Chairman of SBA; Dr. Carla Hayden, Librarian of Congress, USA; HE Meghan Gregonis, US Consul General in Dubai, UAE; Patty M. Wong, President of ALA; Sean Murphy, Charge d’Affaires at the US Embassy Abu Dhabi, UAE; Julius Jefferson Jr, Immediate Past President of ALA; and Eman Bushulaibi, Director of the Sharjah Public Library (SPL).
Other dignitaries at the opening session included Tracie Hall, Executive Director, ALA, and Michael Dowling, Director, International Relations Office, Chapter Relations Office, ALA.
Welcoming guests and participants at the start of the two-day conference, HE Ahmed Al Ameri, Chairman of SBA, shared his joy at the historic achievement of SIBF as the world’s largest book fair in terms of buying and selling copyrights for this year, and underlined how the 2021 edition marked the rebuilding of the post-pandemic growth of the book industry.
Ahmed bin Rakkad Al Ameri, Chairman of SBA
The SBA Chairman said: “Under the guidance and vision of His Highness Sheikh Dr. Sultan bin Muhammad Al Qasimi, Member of the Supreme Council and Ruler of Sharjah, investments in knowledge, books and culture are steering progress in the emirate and advancing research and human development. As gateways to knowledge and culture, libraries have preserved and strengthened the arts, sciences, poetry, humanities, and the world’s collective cultural heritage for future generations.”
He added: “Sharjah is the only city outside of the US, where a conference of this stature is held, and that gives us every reason to be proud. Libraries are the backbone of human development and organising the Sharjah International Library Conference reinforces our commitment to enhance the capabilities of libraries in both managing and strengthening operations, and enhancing services to empower communities to discover, access, and use of information.”
Delivering the keynote address, Dr. Carla Hayden – the first woman and the first African American to lead the national library of the United States, commended the emirate of Sharjah for its pioneering initiatives to develop a knowledge community and nurture a culture of reading.
Pointing out that visibility, engagement, impact, and collaboration are at the heart of what libraries do worldwide, she said: “Librarians are the original search engines; and it is our universal mission to expand access to trusted information and deliver superior services to bridge the gaps in technology and literacy by providing the essential tools that our communities need.”
Dr. Hayden stated that the pandemic amplified the inherent gaps in digital access amongst communities worldwide while describing how libraries responded quickly to become the “digital front doors” and ensure equitable access to a new digital infrastructure for those in need.
Dr. Carla Hayden, Librarian of Congress, USA
Thanking all conference participants for their belief in the power of the book and for coming together to strengthen partnerships, she said, “Libraries are empowerment agencies and librarians are the trusted sources in the digital age. We are the knowledge advocates; and we are at the heart of the world of literacy and books. I thank each one of you for the work that you do.”
Enriching learning experience
An international roster of experts led discussions and presentations on the opening day of the conference. Dr. Hassan A. Alsereihy, Department of Information Science, King Abdulaziz University in Saudi Arabia, and President of AFLI, provided insights into the way forward for libraries in the MENA region at a session titled, ‘Libraries in the MENA Region During Covid and Beyond’. Dr. Huda Abbas, Director of Library and Research, King’s Academy, Jordan, discussed ways of ‘Helping Students Cope and Recover through Bibliotherapy’; while in a session titled, ‘Go Together!’, Tracie Hall, Executive Director, American Library Association explored the critical role of libraries in fostering equity, diversity, and inclusion and closing the information and digital divide.
Sonia Alnahawi, recipient of the 2021 School Librarian of the Year Award, organised by the Emirates Literature Foundation, discussed how to create successful school library programmes in ‘School Librarians of the Year: Sharing Stories, Lessons, and Keys to Successes’.
Dr. Fatma Elzahraa Mohamed Abdo, Library and Assistive Technology consultant, American University in Cairo, Egypt, discussed ways of ‘Serving the Visually Impaired’.
Rania Osman, Head of Library of the Future Section, Innovation, Research, and Technology Directorate, Bibliotheca Alexandrina, Egypt, enhanced the cataloguing skills of participants at the session titled, ‘Cataloging in Arabic with the new RDA’; Kara Jones, University Librarian, American University of Sharjah, delved into the concept of ‘Library as Place and Space: Adjusting during Covid and Beyond’; and Abeer Al Kuwari, Director, Research & Learning Services, Qatar National Library, shared strategies for engaging with the community in ‘Public Engagement During the Pandemic: Challenges and Opportunities’.
The 8th Sharjah International Library Conference will continue its programming tomorrow (November 11) to spotlight successful initiatives and enhance the knowledge, skills and capabilities of library professionals. The day’s events will commence with a keynote address by Patty Wong, President of ALA. Conference participants will also have the opportunity for one-on-one and group discussions with experts on the key issues and challenges facing libraries.
In the lead up to the Sharjah International Library Conference, two interactive pre-conference workshops were held to outline ways to improve library services and advocacy
In the lead up to the 40th Sharjah International Book Fair (SIBF), diverse voices representing the global publishing ecosystem have come together for the 11th edition of the three-day Publishers Conference to network and unite industrywide efforts to build a roadmap for post-pandemic recovery.
Organised by the Sharjah Book Authority (SBA) in partnership with the International Publishers Association (IPA) at Expo Centre Sharjah, the three-day conference began today (Sunday, 31 October) highlighting the need for stronger stakeholder collaboration and cooperation.
In a keynote address, Bodour Al Qasimi, President of IPA, reiterated their commitment to help support publishers emerge stronger from the pandemic.
“As we celebrate the 125th anniversary of the IPA this year, we are reminded of its long-standing role in giving a voice to publishers around the world”, said Al Qasimi, recounting the role IPA has played not just during global crises but throughout history to address key issues like protection of copyright, freedom to publish and the development of literacy, which affect industry stakeholders worldwide.
Referring to IPA discussions in context of Covid-19 over the past 18 months, Bodour Al Qasimi emphasised, “we want to enhance multi-stakeholder cooperation and strengthen solidarity between each. This is why the IPA worked with many partners to develop the International Sustainable Publishing and Industry Resilience Plan, also known as the Inspire Plan.
Bodour Al Qasimi, President of IPA during her keynote address
Photo: Press Release
HE Ahmed Al Ameri, SBA chairman, during his welcome remarks
Photo: Press Release
More than 50 publishing stakeholders have already committed to collaborating on its 10 objectives, following its recent launch. “We hope to see more trade organisations endorse the Plan during the Sharjah International Book Fair, and strengthen our chance of a strong recovery through collective action and increased dialogue”, the IPA President added.
Bodour Al Qasimi also reiterated to the conference attendees that IPA is working with different partners to help bridge the skills gap through the launch of IPA Academy.
Upon its launch, “the Academy will offer online masterclasses in multiple languages to all our members, which will help bridge the skills gap, and help our members adapt to rapidly changing readership and consumer behavior trends,” IPA President explained.
Welcoming participants to the conference, HE Ahmed bin Rakkad Al Ameri, SBA Chairman, reflected on Sharjah’s exemplary human-centric journey of development as envisioned by His Highness Sheikh Dr. Sultan bin Muhammad Al Qasimi, Supreme Council Member and Ruler of Sharjah.
He noted: “In 2001, the world agreed on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), and in 2015, the United Nations announced the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The vital sectors of growth as identified by these Goals included health, education, services and food security. I suggest putting the publishing sector on this list too as it fulfills functions vital to life and progress”.
Al Ameri also suggested that the publishing sector’s contributions feature in global developmental plans and strategies, and that stakeholders collectively agree on indicators to measure the growth, flexibility and sustainability of the global publishing industry.
“If the eradication of illiteracy is the starting point for nation’s development, then the development of skills, conscience and imagination will guarantee that this development is continuous and long-term. The sustainability of the publishing sector, therefore, becomes not an isolated goal but a vital piece in the global developmental,” the SBA Chairman concluded.
Landmark Inspire Charter to build industry solidarity, drive resiliency
Leading the professional agenda of the 11th Publishers Conference was a panel discussion that explored IPA’s Inspire Plan roadmap which sets the stage for the creation of a more united, resilient, and inclusive post-pandemic publishing industry, and paves the way for coordinated action to strengthen and elevate the entire publishing ecosystem.
Moderating a conversation on ‘Coming Together in Crisis: How the International Sustainable Publishing and Industry Resilience (Inspire) Initiative is Supporting Industry Recovery in Unprecedented Times’, Karine Pansa, Vice President of IPA, said: “Inspire was born from a landmark IPA report From Response to Recovery: The Impact of COVID-19 on the Global Publishing Industry, published in November 2020.
A headline finding was a universal call for solidarity in working together towards a more coherent and resilient publishing industry. Our future will be even more co-dependent, and stakeholders need the support of IPA, of governments, and local and international agencies and bodies.”
Lawrence Njagi, Chairperson, Kenya Publishers Association, said: “The pandemic caught us flat footed, crippled our operations; we were not prepared as an industry as a whole, like several other sectors. Issues of overreliance on textbooks over trade books affected us in a huge way with school closures. We lacked marketing plans and teams and work-from-home infrastructure too. So, we started looking at different ways of doing things and the Inspire Plan serves as an excellent guide to overcome these challenges in an inclusive, sustainable manner.”
Bodour Al Qasimi, President of IPA, HE Ahmed Al Ameri, and other attendees of the Publishers Conference
Photo: Press Release
Image from the first panel session
Photo: Press Release
Mingzhou Zhang, President, International Board on Books for Young People (IBBY), said: “The impact of the pandemic on the children’s and YA book industries were unprecedented as most writers and illustrators of children’s books make the lion’s share of their sales in schools – Covid-19 completed blocked their entry into school campuses”.
“However, the industry-wide solidarity we have seen and experienced has been so positive and encouraging. Moreover, the acceleration of digitalisation, especially in the children’s book industry, is a welcome revolution and will continue as a trend long after the pandemic is over,” he added.
Patrici Tixis, Vice President, LIBER Book Fair, and Acting President, Spanish Federation of Publishers’ Guilds, said: “The pandemic has changed everything. We need to see things in a new way. We still don’t know the full impact of these changes, but in Spain for instance, consumer behaviour has already experienced new patterns. In pre-pandemic times, 85 out of 100 books were sold in bookshops and 50 out of 100 were sold on e-commerce platforms.
That is not the reality anymore, especially as bookshops are probably the weakest part of our publishing value chain. They are fragmented and needed financial support. Post-pandemic, they started working closely with printers, publishers and other stakeholders and the current reality is that our book market has grown by 15% compared not only to 2020 but also to pre-pandemic revenues. We are trying to open Spain to global markets like Latin America and Sharjah is going to be a key player in enabling our expansion into regional markets.”
Yuliia Кozlovets, Coordinator of the International Book Arsenal Festival in Kiev, Ukraine, said: “Even before Covid-19, Ukraine’s publishing industry was facing several challenges. During the lockdown, we launched a programme for Ukrainian writers abroad.
This year we organised the Book Arsenal Festival in an online format, applying the lessons we learned during the pandemic. How should we be organising book festivals in the new normal?
The physical presence of publishers at a book fair, the reader’s interaction with books – these are vital to the industry’s growth prospects, but are currently a challenge for us to execute safely. I am, therefore, personally extremely inspired by the Inspire Plan because it addresses common challenges faced by publishing industry worldwide, and at the same time, looks into individual roadblocks. The Plan brings us closer together in addressing these issues collaboratively and cohesively, making sure no one is left behind.”
The Deputy Director-General of the Counter-Terrorism Centre (TEK) was also a target of the Pegasus spyware. It can be seen from a recent database that Zsolt Bodnár’s smartphone was monitored with the software of the Israeli NSO company. In addition to Bodnár, we can also find out the identities of other targets.
Counter-terrorism among the spyware targets
The company that develops Pegasus says of its service that the NSO aims to eradicate terrorism and crime. The program wants to help government agencies. This makes it particularly interesting that
Zsolt Bodnár, former Deputy Director-General of the Hungarian Counter-Terrorism Centre, was targeted by the software.
In 2018, TEK fired Bodnár. There was an investigation in this regard because TEK thought that Bodnár collected inside information. The Forbidden Stories network and the international advocacy organisation Amnesty International co-founded the database. This database contains phone numbers selected by NSO customers, writes blikk.hu.
The Pegasus software may not have hacked the targeted phone. We can only know from the database who was a target. However, technical analysis can detect traces of Pegasus. With the Israeli NSO program, you can access all the data and secret messages of a phone. They can even turn on the device’s microphone or camera.
There is a lot of uncertainty around Bodnár and Pegasus
The NSO claims that only foreign states and their authorities bought Pegasus. Fidesz does not deny that they bought the spyware. Not only Zsolt Bodnár but also Secretary of State Attila Aszódi was a target of the spyware.
It is unusual to observe such a high-ranking man.
Telex.hu writes that governments can observe such a high-ranking person only if a very serious crime is suspected. Based on the information so far, the Hungarian state used Pegasus against Hungarian targets.
Staff from the Tel Aviv embassy met with prominent Israeli politicians and public figures. Ambassador Levente Benkő believes that Israel is an important strategic ally for Hungary. According to him, Israel is the safest point in the Middle East. “The excellent relations between Hungary and Israel are based on common interests,” Benkő said.
Launching the latest round of the Hungary Helps scholarship programme on Friday, Tristan Azbej, the prime minister’s state secretary for aiding persecuted Christians, said the scheme helped students studying in Hungary return to their communities and strengthen them.
Under the scheme which has operated for the past three years, around 300 people from persecuted Christian communities in Africa and Asia have studied free of charge in Hungary, with currently 200 young people enrolled.
This year 100 new students are from Africa, the Middle East and Pakistan, he said, citing the examples of potential Nigerian health professionals, Iraqi oil engineers and Lebanese archaeologists.
One Iraqi returning home studying in Hungary is organising the resettlement of people fleeing the Islamic State, Azbej said as an example.
Hungary keeps in touch with graduates, he said, adding that they were grateful to Hungary since returning to their homelands with a European degree paved the way for far more opportunities.
Budapest’s municipal appeals court on Monday sentenced Syrian national Hassan F. to life imprisonment for crimes against humanity committed as a member of the Islamic State terrorist organisation.
In its binding ruling, the appeals court upheld the life sentence imposed by the municipal court of Budapest in December last year, but added that the defendant had committed the crimes as part of a criminal organisation, and removed the possibility of parole.
According to the charges,
the man was complicit in at least two killings in Syria in 2015, at least one of which involved a beheading.
He was the commander of an armed unit which controlled an area and kept its residents under terror through executions and torture. When the unit was given a command to occupy a town in Syria, the defendant drew up a “death list” of people rejecting IS and then publicly beheaded the community’s imam.
The execution, which the community was forced to watch, was filmed.
The defendant was arrested at Budapest’s Liszt Ferenc International Airport in 2018, and was later sentenced for people smuggling and other crimes.
We also wrote about a similar stroy, when many members of the crew were attacked and hit by a 25-year-old Syrian man on terminal number 2A after they did not let him through the crew passage, details HERE.
This year, for the first time in world expo history, every participating country will have its own pavilion. The opening ceremony takes place on Thursday, 30 September, and the first full day of the expo will also be celebrated with spectacular fireworks.
Since 1851, when the first World Expo – the Great Exhibition – was held in London, World Expos have provided an international platform to discuss the pressing challenges of our time and showcase the nations’ greatest innovations. World Expos can be considered one of the most substantial global economic and cultural events besides the Olympic Games and the FIFA World Cup.
Held between 1 October 2021 and 31 March 2022, the Expo 2020 Dubai is special for two reasons:
it is the largest global event organised since the start of the pandemic and the first world fair to be held in the Middle East.
According to the press release issued by the staff of Expo 2020, this year’s expo will display the most spectacular music and cultural performances in world expo history, built around the three main themes of opportunity, sustainability, and mobility. Sustainability is integrated into every aspect of the event, for example, renewable energy systems with a combined total capacity of 5.5 megawatts are installed on all permanent building projects across the Expo site, and only sustainable materials were used during construction.
The opening ceremony of this “visually stunning and emotionally inspiring event” features the biggest names in the music and entertainment industry, including the world-famous tenor Andrea Bocelli, Grammy-nominated and Golden-Globe-winning actress, singer, and songwriter Andra Day, platinum-selling British singer-songwriter Ellie Goulding, international megastar pianist Lang Lang, and four-time Grammy winner Angelique Kidjo, explained director of event management Tárek Goseh.
The Hungarian pavilion is located within the expo’s Mobility section, and
it will host more than 35 cultural events during the 24 weeks of the expo. Visitors can also browse hand-crafted products, try Hungarian dishes, and taste Hungary’s rightfully famous mineral waters,
According to the official website of the Hungarian pavilion, Hungaryexpo2020, the architecture of the pavilion is strongly linked to the spiritual legacy of Imre Makovecz, and the unique building with timber structure was designed by Makovecz’s former student, the Miklós Ybl Prize-awarded Lőrinc Csernyus. The central element of the pavilion is water since Hungary has a vast variety of unique medicinal and thermal water resources. The central theme of the permanent exhibition will be the presentation of Hungary’s medicinal and thermal waters and their beneficial health effects. The Hungarian pavilion is special for another reason:
it is the only wooden construction in the whole region that Time Out listed among the 15 coolest pavilions of the Dubai Expo.
For more photos and information about the Hungarian pavilion, read our article HERE.
Press release – It takes a very important event for a series of photos to become a world sensation in August, right in the middle of the summer holidays. The images taken in Kabul during the aftermath of the US military withdrawal from Afghanistan have achieved just that, and not without a reason. The utter collapse of the Afghan state in a matter of days and the Taliban takeover must make all of us think.
Sadly enough, we must realize that the two-decade-long Afghanistan activity of the US and its allies from 2001 to 2021 was a total failure. Of course, some analysts and opinion makers were quick to point out that the US was not the first great power to come a cropper in Afghanistan, or that the US had long lost interest in this poor and problematic Central Asian country.
Nevertheless, I still believe it’s important for the western world to realize its mistakes made in Afghanistan and to learn from them, too.
If you compare Afghanistan’s 2001 late summer status quo with that of 2021, you can surely conclude that the country’s situation is more hopeless than ever: while the anti-Taliban “Northern Alliance” was present at least in some areas of the country back in 2001, the Taliban now has complete control over Afghanistan with nothing to challenge their power. Also, while the Taliban system was an isolated regime in 2001, by now they have gotten to the point where more and more countries are considering their de jure recognition as well. If all of that wasn’t enough, the western withdrawal was accompanied by the on-stage appearance of an ever-strengthening China which will hardly make a fuss about human rights issues where it sniffs a strategic and business opportunity. But how could all this happen?
The US and its allies invested an enormous amount of money and energy into building the Afghan state, but they failed to consider the fundamental traits of the Afghan society.
Looking somewhat messianistic at times, the project was aimed at developing a tribal society into a 21st-century democracy. While trying to construct the Afghan state, they completely ignored the fact that Afghanistan was a multi-ethnic and diverse country where the core element of people’s lives is their ethnicity rather than their citizenship in the modern sense. They disregarded the huge difference between the internationally minded Kabul, the local provincial centres and the Afghan rural areas still living in feudalism to this day, and you can’t skip centuries of cultural and societal development by making a few laws. As a result, they failed to find a solution to a situation where the Afghan central government had little control over the country, while the theoretically allied warlords and militia took the Afghan state just as seriously as the Afghan military that had been trained for astronomical sums but simply collapsed in the fateful moment: not at all.
We must realize that the wishful image of a pro-western Afghanistan marching towards democracy with masses of female university students was real in only a few streets of inner city Kabul at best.
We didn’t want to see and understand why the Taliban movement can constantly be present or where it gets its supply and social backing from.
Let’s not deceive ourselves: the country could not have been taken in three days without hardly any rifle shots if they had not enjoyed the support of many Afghan people. I am talking about the Afghan people we failed to give any prospects to in 20 years. Instead, we put a weak and corrupt government over their heads, generating a constant civil war.
The exploding post-withdrawal chaos was like an admission of failure, while the fact that we could hardly do anything to rescue the Afghans who did their best for the model offered by the western countries and truly believed in it, is nothing short of a moral fall for us.
After seeing the images taken at the Kabul airport, we can hardly expect anyone living in an authoritarian regime to openly dedicate themselves to democratic values from now on.
Unlike us, religious extremists can be happy: they can feel justified in their belief that if they keep fighting persistently, they may even get recognized by the international community.
With increasing frequency over the past months, I have been forced to come to the conclusion that if we, i.e., western democracies, want to avoid becoming the minority and being surrounded by a growing number of authoritarian and, in fact, terrorist-leaning regimes, it’s high time for us to show more interest and empathy towards the other parts of the world. And we should be able to make sacrifices when it comes to that, too. It would be in our interest. If we fail to realize that, we’ll have nobody but ourselves to blame.
Hungary and Poland are closely cooperating in preventing some western European states from imposing on the European Union the “flawed and dangerous” migration policy whose consequences have been felt since 2015, Péter Szijjártó, Hungary’s foreign minister, said after talks with his Polish counterpart Zbigniew Rau in Karpacz, Poland.
The situation in Afghanistan, he said, keeps deteriorating, with reports on a forthcoming civil war emerging but half of the population of that country had lived on welfare even before the Islamist Taliban rebels came to power.
“The western European statements that can be interpreted as invitations to all Afghans are particularly irresponsible,” Szijjártó said.
Europe is exposed to migratory pressures not only from Africa and the Middle East, but even from the east, through Belarus, he said, adding that another wave from Afghanistan would entail “incalculable consequences”, he said.
Hungary and Poland’s migration policies “are based on common sense”,
Szijjártó said, recalling that Hungary had built a fence along its southern border in 2015, and Poland is doing the same along its eastern border.
The two governments are not only talking about the need to help where needs arise, the minister said, citing a Hungarian-Polish project to grant 1 million euros’ worth of aid to Jordanian hospitals caring for Syrian refugees.
Szijjártó qualified Western Europe’s current migration policy as a “huge threat” to European security and identity, adding that a massive wave of refugees would increase the risk of the spread of the coronavirus.
Austrian Minister of the Interior Karl Nehammer blamed Hungarian border control officers for the many unidentified migrants. From his standpoint, Hungary should act according to the European Union’s law and defend the borders more effectively.
Unfortunately, the job of border control officers is really difficult. At the Schengen outer borders, officers had to deal with 53,297 cases this year, while in 2020, the number of cases where interference was necessary was only 17,442 in the same period of time.
“The direct reason for the migratory pressure is that Greece transported tens of thousands of refugees from the camps on the islands to the mainland, most of who are headed towards Hungary on the Western Balkans route,” hvg.hu quotes the police.
Austrian politician Roland Fürst has data on the migration issue, indicating that this year, 8,000 people crossed the Austrian-Hungarian border illegally, out of which 20% are Afghans.
90% of Afghan migrants are men. 90% of those who asked for residency permits but were denied are still in the country.
Interior Minister Karl Nehammer (ÖVP), who said that “There are a lot of migrants here, nobody knows who they are. Hungary cannot allow that to happen. They have to adhere to EU law and protect their external borders more efficiently.”
He then went on to add that the European Union is “sending the wrong signals” regarding the current migration policy, and since the EU does not react, Austria must “lead the fight against the illegal smugglers who are repeatedly endangering people’s lives.”
The Hungarian police posted a video about their press conference, and on their official website, they also posted a graphic video about the migration issue.
Not only did the 20-year international campaign in Afghanistan end up a failure but the Western world has been making mistake after mistake since, Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó said ahead of an informal meeting with his European Union counterparts on Thursday.
Since withdrawing from Afghanistan, the Western allies have constantly been making irresponsible statements urging Afghans to come to Europe, Szijjártó said on arriving at the meeting in Brdo Castle, near Kranj, in Slovenia. “This is extremely irresponsible,” Szijjártó said, adding that Western politicians were not wary of
“repeating the mistakes of 2015”
when more than a million migrants fleeing from the Middle East crossed into Europe.
Szijjártó said that Afghans were now being encouraged to come to Europe the same way Syrians had been in 2015. “This poses a serious migration risk,” he said. Hungary rescued Afghans who helped its troops during the military campaign, he noted. “But those apart, we refuse to take in a single Afghan,” the minister added.
The migration wave should be stopped rather than encouraged,
Szijjártó said. “We refuse to take part in any redistribution scheme, whether requested by the EU or NATO,” he added.
EU foreign ministers are focusing on the topic of Afghanistan on the first day of their meeting before discussing China, India and cooperation with the Gulf countries on Friday.
Persecuted Christian communities in the Middle East and in Africa appreciated the government’s Hungary Helps humanitarian aid programme, the state secretary responsible for aiding persecuted Christians told MTI in Rome on Saturday.
Tristan Azbej is member of a Hungarian delegation led by the prime minister attending the 12th international conference of Catholic legislators in the Italian capital over the weekend.
He told MTI by phone that on Friday he had participated at the papal audience which also attended by Ignatius Aphrem, the Patriarch of the Syriac Orthodox Church. Azbej noted the patriarch’s appreciation of the support Pope Francis had showed for the Hungarian government’s aid to persecuted Christians.
He said that Hungary’s aid has greatly contributed to the survival of Christians persecuted by the Islamic State or jihadist forces in Syria and Iraq or their return from their journey of migration.
The state secretary called the persecution of Christians “one of the largest humanitarian crises in the world”, affecting 340 million people worldwide. At the same time, international forums mostly “ignore it completely”, he said.
Azbej said that modelled on the Hungarian programme, Poland and Croatia have recently launched similar programmes to aid persecuted Christians in the Middle East. An international working group has also been set up to adapt the Hungarian programme with the aim to provide aid directly to persecuted Christians, he said.
A 69-year-old Egyptian man claimed that he was his grandfather.
According to atv.hu, he was caught when the police found a teenage boy wandering alone in Budapest with tens of thousands of euros in his pocket. The officers of the 11th district police headquarter found the boy on August 26, at around 4 pm, on Thököly Street.
He did not have valid documents but had tens of thousands of euros in his pocket.
Following the officers’ request, he led them to his accommodation in the 7th district of Budapest where they found a 69-year-old Egyptian man. He claimed to be the grandfather of the child. However, they could not explain why the boy was wandering in the city with such a high amount of cash.
During the police investigation, it became apparent that he is not a relative of the boy. Instead, police found three Syrian citizens in his flat, together with a Moroccan and a Turkish national.
None of them could prove their lawful staying in Hungary.
Afterwards, the Egyptian national was taken into custody, while the migrants he hid in his apartment were transferred to the police headquarters of Budapest. Finally, the father of the kid went to the police station. Based on the information gathered by the police,
the Egyptian man wanted to smuggle the boy and his father to Austria.
Meanwhile, he took rent from the migrants living in his apartment.
Police officers arrested him on the suspicion of human trafficking and requested his pre-trial detention. Authorities took the father and his son to the airport police headquarters. Moreover, they transferred the migrants found in the apartment to the border station of Tompa.
