Artan P쳮aska
apernaska@tiranatimes.com
On the 27th of June 2009 Hungary celebrated the twentieth anniversary of the dismantling of the “iron curtain” on its border with Austria, in the presence of high level authorities of Eastern and Western European countries. The Albanian president, Bamir Topi, attended the ceremonies which were honored by the presence of top officials from the EU and NATO countries. Meanwhile, in Tirana, on the 26th of June 2009 the Embassies of Hungary and Austria commemorated jointly this twentieth anniversary. The film “The First Brick from the Berlin Wall” was shown on this occasion and ambassadors of both countries discussed the importance of such an event as well as on the position of their countries towards European Union enlargement and visa liberalization. The Hungarian Ambassador, Mr. Sandor Molnar, declared that “Actually, as in the past, the Hungarian Foreign Policy is a candidate for abrogation of separation lines in Europe. For this reason we support the earliest possible integration of the Western Balkans in the European Union and visa liberalization with these countries. We still remember what it means not to be free to circulate and the sensation of isolation.”
The History
The words “the iron curtain” were coined by Winston Churchill in his speech delivered on the 5th of March 1946 at Westminster College at Fulton, United Kingdom. It was a time when the former Soviet Union had begun to dominate Eastern Europe and had created a physically separate line between the two physical and ideological blocks.
On the 27th of June 1989, a few months ahead of the fall of the Berlin Wall – torn down on the 9th of November 1989 – the Foreign Ministers of Austria and Hungary, Alois Mock and Gyula Horn, united near Klingenbach, Austria, to cut off some of the “electric wires of the SZ-100 signal-system” on the border between the two countries. The process had begun earlier but a date was chosen to give to the events a full symbolic hook-up. In addition to the “dismantlement of the iron curtain” along the border, on the 10th of September 1989, Hungary opened its borders with Austria and declared open admission to Eastern German refugees. Chancellor Helmut Kohl, at the celebration of the German reunification, on the 4th of October 1990, qualified these events as “The First Brick off the Berlin Wall”.
