TV interview: Croatian president visits Hungary as friend
Budapest, October 8 (MTI) – The Croatian president said she came as a friend to Hungary, a neighbouring country that is her country’s friend.
The exchange of rhetoric on the migration issue has put relations between the countries to a stress to a certain degree, but this is only a “temporary” situation, Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic told public news channel M1 in an exclusive interview late on Wednesday.
The president said that the tide of migrants had met Croatia unprepared even if it could be foreseen several months before.
“It must be admitted that Croatia’s system for handling migrants collapsed within a few hours,” she said.
“We have wasted several months. We should have coordinated preparations with the neighbouring countries, Macedonia, Serbia, Hungary, Slovenia and Austria, and others, as well as with Brussels,” Grabar-Kitarovic said.
Croatia wants to help all these people, she said, adding however that a distinction should be made between migrants and refugees.
The Croatian president noted she had given warning earlier that the migration issue has not only a humanitarian, but an economic and social aspect as well.
Croatia is not opposed to migration and would not want to ban migrants from entering the EU, but it wants control over events, she said, calling registration and fingerprinting imperative.
Grabar-Kitarovic said Europe should expect a lasting migration wave which will require a long-term migration policy.
She urged tackling the migration problem at its roots, in cooperation with Turkey and Lebanon, adding that protecting Europe’s borders was also a must.
Photo: MTI
The refugees now regret they came to Europe
According to napimigrans.com, Iraqi refugees sent a message to their compatriots on Facebook not to come to Europe because they will regret it – Finnish Yle television said.
According to the website Sputnik, the video reveals Iraqis fleeing war have been considering how to go back their shattered homeland.
“I wish we had not come to Europe” – the refugees said on the video who also revealed that they spent a lot of money to go here. “We made a serious mistake by coming to Europe” – they told the Finnish television.
Mustafa, who sent a message to his compatriots in Arabic, claimed his life had been much better in Iraq, even though they had been exposed to constant danger. “I do not care, I will return my country and would rather die there” – the Iraqi man said desperately.
The refugees also complained the Finnish television about that life is very expensive in Europe and the prices are extremely high. They hardly get food and clothing in the reception centers, which also shocked them. According to them, being a refugee is “a terribly humiliating thing”.
However, some people doubt the authenticity of the report. Several comments accuse the Finnish government of intentional manipulation, saying the report is much more like a PR campaign than the demonstration of reality.
The accusations are not unfounded, however, since Helsinki recently stated that Finland was considering the closure of borders to prevent the influx of refugees to the country.
Since January, it is estimated that about half a million refugees arrived in the European Union.
based on the article of napimigrans.com
translated by BA
Letter from Petra László – The kicking camerawoman spoke
I sincerely regret what happened – it is in the letter sent by Petra László, the camerawoman who tripped and kicked the migrants, to mno.hu.
“I sincerely regret what happened. Just now I could pull myself together enough to write. In fact I am in shock from what I did and what they did to me.
“I filmed with camera, hundreds of migrants broke out, they broke through the police cordon, one of them rushed to me and I was scared. I was afraid as they were swarming me and then something burst me. With a camera in my hand, I did not see who are coming towards me, and I just thought I was attacked and I have to protect myself. It’s hard to make good decisions at a time when one is in a panic and hundreds of people rush in her face. I failed at that moment. I’m sorry about what happened, and as a mother, I specially regret that the fate rolled even a kid in my way and I did not notice. I panicked, and as I see myself in the recordings, as if it wouldn’t be me. I sincerely regretted what I did and I take responsibility for it.
I am not a heartless, child-kicking, racist camerawoman. I did neither deserve for the witch hunt against me nor the smearing, often death threats. I’m just a woman, a now unemployed mother of a small child, who made a bad decision in a panic situation. I am truly sorry.
Petra László”
What happened?
The statement of N1TV’s ex-camerawoman was sent by her husband to mno.hu. Petra László tripped a migrant running with his child at Roszke on Tuesday, and she kicked two other people – including a young child. Szabolcs Kisberk, the editor in chief of the television said in a statement that Laszlo was dismissed with immediate effect because she behaved unacceptable. “The case is considered closed from our side” – Kisberk added.
M4 Sport channel starts on July 18
According to sportmenu.net, the first thematic sports channel of the public television starts with live stream at 8 am, on July 18. The free-to-air new channel brings national and several prestigious international sports events in the homes. The M4 Sport is the channel of the Hungarian sport – it deals with all the major domestically-involved sports events, as well as with Hungary’s 5 spectacle sport and 16 priority sport branches, while it is entertaining and educating the love of sport.
“As sport is diverse, we tried to use every means with the editors in order to be the “serving” diverse: by the involvement of the Hungarian sport associations, with nearly thirty kinds of sport magazine programs, portrait interviews, archive and unique contents, we guarantee that M4 is more than just a sports channel” – Zoltan Vobeczky, sports chief editor of MTVA said.
On weekdays, from 4 pm to midnight, live broadcasts are part of the live program, including studio interviews, magazines. On weekends, live shows can be viewed on M4 even from 7 am.
“The July 26 Formula One Hungarian Grand Prix, of course, will be seen via M4, and the free practices on Friday and races will also be broadcasted live. The future key contents of the channel are, besides Formula One, are national football championship, next year’s Rio Olympic Games and the European Football Championship as well as the broadcasting of the World Championship” – the sports chief editor added.
M4 program offer for the first weekend of the channel:
At the starting weekend of M4, we can see a live broadcast of the Kayak-Canoe World Championship in Szolnok, of the Davis Cup matches of the Hungarian national team and of the biggest show jumping competition of the year, CSIO***W Grand Prix Budapest. The new sports channel reports the Fencing World Championship in Moscow and the Beach Football World Cup as well.
M4 Sport also broadcasts the 2015/16 matches of OTP Bank League. In addition to the matches, you can follow the weekly summary program only on the new sports channel.
In the first round, M4 Sport broadcasts Ujpest FC-Paksi FC from 6 pm on Saturday, Budapest Honved-Videoton from 8:30 pm and Szombathely Haladas-Ferencvaros from 8 pm on Sunday.
based on the article of sportmenu.net
translated by BA
Radio and Television History Exhibition Opens
Budapest (MTI) – Radio and Television History Exhibition has opened in the Pollack Mihaly Square on this week, which was made interactive by digital tools.
Laszlo Zsolt Szabo, CEO of the Media Service Support and Asset Management Fund (MTVA) said at the opening ceremony: the visitors can learn about the essence behind the objects shown in the exhibition of the public media’s history with the help of photos, audios and motion pictures, and they can try television and radio in the studio.
In the building of the exhibition hall, there is Samsung Smart School with the latest technology, where digital trainings and workshops will be held for students. The pupils will be able to browse the attractions of the Hungarian literature and history in the ‘smart school rooms’.
Laszlo Zsolt Szabo said: they wanted to make more the former technological history exhibition, so that visitors can learn about what the exhibits broadcast. They also considered important in the renewal of the exhibition that visiting students can get real experience, MTI said.
‘Their usual way, holding tablets in their hands and using QR codes, they can not only view the objects, but they are able to follow audio and moving image materials in the tablets’ – Szabo said. He added that those who are interested will have the opportunity to try inter alia the wind machine, and materials made in the studios can be taken home.
Judit Czunyi Bertalan, Secretary of State for Public Raising said: children are using IT-products routinely and they learn with them, collecting information from the Internet.
‘It is the school’s mission to provide students to use this information consciously, organized, strengthening or expanding the school contents’ – she added. The Secretary of State stressed that such a historical exhibition and smart classroom can greatly contribute to the acquisition of information, and the historical reality can be much easier transferred than in the school.
According to MTI, Istvan Facsko, president of Samsung Electronics Co. Hungarian Ltd. said they would like to make learning easier by digital items. He reminded that they signed a co-operation agreement with MTVA last summer and they decided they would make a smart classroom in Budapest too, model of the one in Jaszfenyszaru. As he said, they ‘conjured’ a working interactive whiteboard and provided Samsung software, which can help students learning.
based on the article of MTI
translated by BA
Photo: MTI
Public media to overhaul TV channels
Budapest, January 6 (MTI) – Public television M1 will from March 15 broadcast non-stop news and transfer its non-news programmes to Duna TV, a joint statement by the leaders of public media outlet MTVA, channels M1 and Duna TV said on Tuesday.
A sports channel dubbed M4 will be launched in July and M2 will broadcast music programmes in the evenings from March.
The Media Service Support and Asset Management Fund MTVA will give a complete overhaul to the M1 channel, which is set to broadcast news around the clock, with news magazines including bulletins on stocks, economy, farming, innovation and culture. Programmes will also cover European and global politics as well as events in the Carpathian Basin.
M1 will broadcast an English-language news roundup late in the evening. MTVA has commissioned British media professional Simon Jago to draw up a brand-new design to M1, the statement added.
Duna TV, the channel that traditionally targeted audiences beyond the borders, launched in 1993, will take on the role of the “main public channel” and will host popular programmes, cultural and religious magazines currently running on M1.
The statement said that MTVA would renew its mobile platforms too.
Photo: pixabay
Public Media to Launch Youth, Sport Channels in 2015
Budapest (MTI) – Hungary’s public media will launch two new channels next year, one targeting viewers aged between 16 and 35, and the other broadcasting sport events, the Hungarian Television (MTV) and the Media Service Support and Asset Management Fund (MTVA) said on Thursday.
The youth channel dubbed Petofi TV will focus on broadcasting live events, festivals, concerts and other entertainment, as well as films and documentaries that will represent a new approach in style, rhythm and atmosphere in the public media, a statement sent to MTI shows.
The sport channel dubbed M4 aims to be a competitor to the existing commercial sport channels, it added. A mission of M4 will be to present events linked to the 16 branches of sport that receive higher than average central support in Hungary.
MTVA launched its M3 “retro” channel in December last year, broadcasting films of the Hungarian Television’s archives.
Photo: splitshire.com
Public TV Starts Classical Music Talent Contest
Budapest (MTI) – Public television M1 will on Friday start the broadcast of a talent contest for classical music which has attracted applications from nearly two thousand young musicians and singers around Hungary.
Virtuosos, the first talent contest of its kind in the world will include youngsters competing in three age groups, the Media Service Support and Asset Management Fund (MTVA) said.
The jury of renowned professionals will include opera singer Erika Miklosa, music historian Andras Batta, conductor Gergely Kesselyak, pianist Attila Nemethy and violinist Miklos Szenthelyi.
The chief patron of the programme is Ioan Holender, who has headed the Vienna State Opera for more than two decades.
During the finals in December, winners in each age group and one top winner of the entire competition will be chosen by audiences. The age group winners will get the opportunity to make a record and perform at the Avery Fisher Hall in New York, the Roy Thompson Hall in Toronto and the Kravic Center in Miami, respectively. The top winner will additionally receive a cash prize of 12 million forints (EUR 40,000).
Photo: MTI – Tibor Rosta
Ministry calls on RTL to act responsibly towards government
(MTI) – The broadcaster RTL group should act responsibly and proportionately bear their share of the tax burden in Hungary, the economy ministry said on Friday.
RTL should refrain from besmirching the Hungarian government and scaring off investors to the country, the ministry said in a statement sent to MTI.
It charged that while RTL holds 40 percent of the Hungarian ads market the company had reported fictitious losses over several years and failed to contribute to Hungary’s operations in proportion to its profits, unlike most economic players.
The statement said that all this happens in a country in Central Europe which has not yet recovered from the economic disadvantages suffered “from the dictatorship foreign occupiers forced upon it for decades. It is unacceptable that after the Hungarian government had created a free media market for foreign investors, one of these companies regards the country as a colony, available for plundering,” the statement added.
An article published in the Financial Times on Thursday gave warning that RTL Group, Europe’s largest broadcaster, had cut its 2014 outlook as a new advertising tax was introduced in Hungary in the first half of the year.
RTL, which is controlled by German media group Bertelsmann, said “the precipitous introduction of the confiscatory advertising tax is an alarming signal for all international investors in Hungary”.
Kroes Says Media Freedom Remains Under Threat In Hungary
(MTI) – Media freedom remains under threat in Hungary, said Neelie Kroes, Vice-President of the European Commission in charge of the digital agenda, in a blog entry about Hungary’s ad tax on Monday.
“A free and plural media is the foundation of a free society, and a safeguard of democratic tradition. The new ‘advertising tax’ in Hungary shows it is still very much under threat,” the Dutch liberal politician said.
She criticised parliament for introducing the tax “in just a few days, without significant debate or consultation.” It is supposedly aimed to increase revenues but in practice it disproportionately affects one single company, RTL, she added.
“The conclusion is obvious. RTL is one of the few channels in Hungary not simply promoting a pro-Fidesz line; it is hard to see that the goal is anything other than to drive them out of Hungary,” Kroes said.
“But it is about more than just one tax or just one company: it is part of a pattern that is deeply worrying; a pattern contrary to the EU’s values. Taxation cannot be an instrument for discrimination, and tax policy should not be a political weapon,” she added.
To read the blog entry in full, visit http://ec.europa.eu/commission_2010-2014/kroes/en/blog/media-freedom-remains-under-threat-hungary
Photo: sarnyai.hu
RTL Klub Tax Write-Off In 2011 Comes To HUF 23bn, Says Varga
(MTI) – Commercial TV channel RTL Klub recorded 23 billion forints (EUR 74.8bn) in deferred losses back in 2011, and this is an amount that already raises eyebrows, the economy minister told MTI on Thursday.
Mihaly Varga said he had read in an article posted on an online newspaper that in 2011 RTL Klub had purchased two cable companies and when the one year required by law had lapsed it sold the same two businesses to its own German parent. The transaction had resulted in a loss on paper which RTL deducted from its business tax base and paid no tax, Varga said, calling the deal “shocking”.
He said the amount in question was unusually high even for a large corporation and was enough in itself to spark interest with the economy minister. The whole transaction has the appearance of a tax fiddle rather than an investment or a development, Varga said.
Varga said on Wednesday he had asked the tax office to launch a tax investigation at RTL Klub on suspicion of “a fictitious transaction”.
The channel has been at loggerheads with the government ever since it announced the introduction of an ad tax, which RTL finds discriminative and disproportionate. RTL said it had paid nearly 9 billion forints (EUR 29.4m) in tax last year and rejected accusations by Janos Lazar, the head of the prime minister’s office, that it was a bad taxpayer.
Govt calls RTL Klub “Revenge” For Ad Tax Unacceptable
(MTI) – The government deems it “unacceptable” that commercial channel RTL Klub “has launched a war” because it has to pay tax in Hungary and wants to “take revenge” on the prime minister’s father, the Prime Minister’s Office said in a statement on Friday.
Small businesses in Hungary, too, are subject to tax and “it is natural” that RTL Klub, a firm generating billions of forints in revenue, has to pay taxes, and, just like others, it must share the public burden, the office said.
It said the other commercial players paid tax on advertisements, yet “none of them had waged a war of revenge”.
RTL on Friday evening broadcast a news report on the financial assets of Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s father, saying that the opposition Democratic Coalition called for a probe into the about one billion forints dividend his mining firm had paid out since the 2008 economic and financial crisis, quoting the latest issue of a company gazette.
Media companies, publishers, outdoor ad firms and the publishers of online ads will be subject to a tax on ad revenues, parliament decided on Wednesday.
The ad tax bill was approved in fast-track procedure with 144 votes in favour and 30 against.
The tax will not apply to annual revenue below 500 million forints (EUR 1.7m) but will be as high as 40 percent above 20 billion forints.
Earlier in the day, Luxembourg-based RTL Group in a letter turned to President Janos Ader not to sign the law, saying “it hurt common European values such as press freedoms and impartiality in free market”.
The letter, signed by Guillaume De Posch, Co-Chief Executive Officer of RTL Group and Andreas Rudas, member of the board of directors RTL Hungary, criticised that nearly fifty percent of the sectoral tax would have to be borne by them and that the legislation had been voted on without prior social and professional consultations.
RTL Klub is Hungary’s largest commercial TV channel present on the market since 1997.
Photo: www.avarositanya.hu
RTL: Ad Tax Spells End Of Press Freedom In Hungary
Berlin, June 6 (MTI) – The planned introduction of a tax on adverts spells the end of press freedom in Hungary, a senior official of the RTL Group told Friday’s German daily Handelsblatt.
“From the time that the tax is bulldozed through, there won’t be any press freedom left in Hungary,” Andreas Rudas, the group’s head of eastern and south-eastern European operations told the paper.
“It is an attempt to restrict press freedom without dictatorial measures,” he added.
He insisted that the tax “clearly targets RTL”, which owns Hungary’s commercial RTL Klub channel.
The RTL Group does not want to dodge the conflicts ahead and will not discard its interests in Hungary, Rudas said, adding that “we have no intention of leaving Hungary.”
Fidesz group leader Antal Rogan said on Wednesday that parliament would discuss the bill on introducing a tax on advertising next Tuesday and Wednesday.
Photo: www.rtl.de
ATV Broke Law By Broadcasting Political Campaign Material, Says Top Court
Budapest, April 8 (MTI) – The Kuria, Hungary’s supreme court, has ruled that commercial broadcaster ATV broke the election law by placing altogether 11 political ads for the leftist opposition in the course of one of its shows.
After a complaint by a private individual, the National Election Committee ruled that ATV violated the law when it showed political ads during its coverage of a political gathering of the Unity alliance outside the Opera House on March 30.
It would have been possible for the broadcaster to have played the ads had it made a request to the committee by Feb. 15, but it failed to do so, the committee said.
The election committee fined ATV one million forints (EUR 3,270).
Photo: nettv.blog.hu
‘Fölszállott a páva’ – Folk Music And Dance TV Show starts on March 8th
The broadcasting of the talent spotter show first began in the 1960’s by the original name ´Röpülj páva´. At the beginning, many raised doubts whether the show will actually become successful, but it eventually became highly popular, touched a whole country, and launched a number of internationally known performers on their way to fame as a folk music TV contest.
The current contestants were introduced during 8 regional episodes, and presented their musical and dancing skills between May and September of 2013. The best 48 will emerge from these performers, and the spectators will have an opportunity of seeing them again on stage on March 8th 2014, live on Duna TV. The contestants come from Hungary and bordering countries. The jury passed 100 performances on to the semi-finals, the anchormen will be Novák Péter and Herczku Ágnes.
The jury members in 2014 will be Zsuráfszky Zoltán, Kossuth-Prize winner choreographer, Sebestyén Márta, Kossuth-Prize winner singer,Sebő Ferenc, Kossuth-Prize winner musician –also the head of the jury-, Agócs Gergely, ethnographer, musician, and lastly, Diószegi László, historian, choreographer, and the president of Martin Folk Dance Association.
Participants could join the contest from the whole Hungarian speech area between the ages of 16 and 35 in 4 different categories: soloist singers and groups, soloist musicians and groups, soloist dancers, pairs and groups. Observations are that due to the success of the last year’s lineup, more professional dancers and singers presented themselves next to amateurs this year.
In 2012, UNESCO provided Fölszállott a páva with sponsorship, which was announced during a live airing of the show as a great honour.
Translated by Reka Jancskar
Photo: MTI – Tibor Illyes
The Hungarian TV2 rejects charges concerning sale
Budapest, January 17 (MTI) – Hungarian commercial television TV2 refutes accusations made recently in connection with its sale and against its new owners, spokesman Tamas Koltay told MTI on Friday.
TV2 on Friday requested from several media companies and editorial offices to issue corrections for “unfounded statements” that were included in reports and articles prepared on the basis of the press conference Socialist politician Robert Braun had given on January 13, he said in a statement.
Braun said that he had recently bought a single share in the German media company in order to inform other shareholders that “the management is giving help to a nefarious and corrupt business”.
He said that if ProSiebenSat.1, the parent company, does not stop the sale of TV2 — one of two major commercial television stations in Hungary — within a week then he would turn to the European Commission and the US Justice Department (one of the owners of ProSiebenSat.1 is an American investor) over the matter.
The German company has extended a loan to the new owners, Zsolt Simon, TV2’s managing director, and Yvonne Dederick, the station’s finance director, to fund the purchase.
Braun said it was suspected that the buyers were preparing to pay off the loan using revenue from state-led advertising once the ruling Fidesz party were to win the spring general election.
Koltay called the charges untrue, asserting that the purchase had been made in a fully transparent way, by fulfilling all requirements set by international and Hungarian laws.
Hungary’s Media Service targets overseas viewers for Duna World TV
Hungary’s public service media organisation, Media Service Support and Asset Management Fund (MTVA), is targeting viewers in Australia and the Americas through a new deal with RRsat Global Communications Network, digitaltveurope.net reports.
The digitaltveurope.net said, content management and distribution firm RRsat will distribute MTVA’s Duna World TV channel and radio station via its platforms on Optus D2, Galaxy 19 and Intelsat 21, in a move that will open up MTVA’s content to emigrant Hungarian populations in North and South America and Australia.
Read more HERE.
Photo: www.biatv.hu
TV2 – Hungarian TV channel fined to suspend broadcast for half day today
Budapest, January 2 (MTI) – Commercial channel TV2 will be forced to go blank for half a day from Thursday noon because it violated media regulations protecting minors back in 2009.
ORTT, Hungary’s media authority at the time, decided to impose the sanction in July 2009 because a chat show entitled Joshi Bharat had been shown by TV2 with the incorrect on-screen rating symbol and at a time-slot that went against the 1996 law on radio and television broadcasts.
In line with the ruling, the chat show should have been broadcast with a 16 rating for including indirect references to violence, sexuality and conflict management by violent means. Programmes rated 16 must be broadcast with a yellow circle with the number 16 written inside and only after 9pm and before 5am. The ORTT established that the channel violated these regulations also by showing previews of the programme outside of this timeframe, in the afternoon.
TV2 appealed against the ruling several times but eventually the supreme court Kuria has also upheld the decision that forces the channel to suspend its broadcast for 720 minutes.