The Hungarian nation “has become a world nation”, and the Hungarian government sees that as an opportunity, Zsolt Semjén, the deputy prime minister, told the 13th session of the Hungarian Diaspora Council in Budapest on Wednesday.
Semjén: Hungary a world nation
Semjén said Hungarians were present all over the world. “Our task is to turn challenges into opportunities, therefore we consider it a kind of opportunity that Hungarians have become a world nation.” He said the Hungarian diaspora was a “bridgehead” for Hungary in terms of culture, the economy, and “in all other areas of life.”
Funding earmarked for policies for Hungarians across the borders has grown more than tenfold since 2010, Semjén said.
The Hungarian government is supporting 5,500 ethnic Hungarian organisations, while a total of 9,300 projects involving ethnic Hungarian communities have been completed, Semjén said. Hungary has assisted in the reconstruction or rebuilding of 3,700 churches as well as 1,000 kindergartens and creches outside the country, he said. Some 230,000 children enrolled in Hungarian schools across the borders receive a 100,000 forint (EUR 245) grant every year from Hungary’s government, he said.
Within the government’s “Beyond the Borders” programme, some 530,000 children have travelled abroad to areas with large Hungarian communities. This year, 52,000 students will receive the same support, he added. Hungarian students across the borders will also receive assistance in visiting Hungary or other countries with ethnic Hungarians, he said.
Semjén said he saw Israel’s policy regarding diasporas as an example. “Wherever a Jewish person may live in the world, they can always go home to Israel if they feel they are in danger. Hungary is a country where all Hungarians, no matter where they live in the world, can return to if they feel they are in trouble or their lives are threatened,” he said.
“The meaning and aim of Hungary” was to ensure that the quality of life of all Hungarians was improved, that the nation was preserved and that the country was homeland to all Hungarians, Semjén said.
The deputy prime minister said Hungarians in the home country, in the Carpathian Basin and the diaspora “are the legs the country rests on”. Should any of those “three legs” fall out, “the whole chair will fall apart”. “We are committed to preserving all parts of the Hungarian nation in its entirety, and one of the tools of that is the Diaspora Council,” he said.
The government “is running a detailed, well-working … system and has expanded all support it could to Hungarians across the borders,” he said, pointing to support for mothers and neonatal bonds.
He said he saw the “legal unification of the nation through the citizenship law” as a “personal life goal”. So far, 1.2 million Hungarians have taken up the citizenship, he said.
Regarding support for Transcarpathian Hungarians, Semjén said Hungary was on the side of peace. “Let there be a fair peace, but one of the basic requirements of that is ensuring the rights of minorities.”
He also thanked diaspora Hungarians for their “faithfulness to the nation”, and for standing up for “the Hungarian cause”. “Just like we can count on you, you can count on us,” he said.
Lőrinc Nacsa, the state secretary for Hungarians across the borders, said the meeting has drawn Hungarians from 30 countries.
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