The Guardian of Liberty - Nemzetőr, 1989 (12. évfolyam, 1-4. szám)

1989-05-01 / 3. szám

THE GUARDIAN OF LIBERTY (NEMZETŐR) MAY-JUNE, 1989 "Everyoeeiiasthe right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion" Allide IS Pereid Oedoration of Homan Eights V 01.3 XXXIII BI-MONTH L Y B 20435fe­Hungary Honours 195® Martyrs Hungarians of all walks of life and of almost all political opinions, including even those Com­munists who are newly converted to economic reform and political pluralism, united on June 16 to pay tribute to the martyrs of their small nation's 1956 Revolution. The occasion - given maximum coverage by the State-controlled media - was the 31st anniversary of the hanging in Budapest's cent­ral prison of Imre Nagy, *he Prime Minister deposed by the invading Soviet army which suppressed the Revolution with mcssive blood­shed. About 300,000 mourners attended his funeral, and that of four of his similarly executed advisers, in Heroes' Square, Budapest. During this profoundly moving ceremony, lasting four and a half hours, the coffins of Nagy and the other four (Miklós Gimes, Géza Losonczy, Defence Minister General Pál Maiéter and József Szilágyi) stood on the black-draped steps on an art gallery. Behind Nagy's remains was an empty coffin inscribed "The Martyrs of ’56." A flag from 1956, with a hole in the middle where the hammer-and-sickle emblem had been cut out, was unfurled. A guard of honour wore arm­­bands bearing the number "301" - a reference to the plot in Budapest’s Rákoskeresztúr cemet­ery from which the bodies of Nagy and his associates were recently exhumed, having 'lain in unmarked graves for more than 30 years. The vast number of wreaths included those of the National Assembly; Prime Minister Miklós Németh, Minister of State Imre Pozsgay and Deputy Premier Péter Medgyessy on behalf of the government (but not the Communist Party); leading Catholic, Protestant and Jewish clergy; and diplomats from Western and non-aligned countries, including India and Yugoslavia. Among the other wreath-layers were the Czechoslovak opposition Charter 77 human rights movement, the Polish Independent Stud­ents’ Association, refugees from Romania, non- Communisf Hungarian political parties, the Hungarian-Polish Solidarity Society, the Paris­­based Hungarian League of Human Rights, the Hungarian Academv of Sciences. Hungarian Radio and Television, the Hungarian Writers’ Association, the Independent Lawyer’s Forum, the Committee for Historical Justice and the European Congress of Free Hungarians (esta­blished in Strasbourg by 1970). A recording giving the names and ages of 240 of the thousands of mainly young people executed after the 1956 Revolution was played over loudspeakers. One of those named was Peter Mansfeld, who in 1956, when aged only 15, fought against Soviet tanks. He was later imprisoned until he reached the age of 18, when he was hanged. A recording of a speech made by Nagy on October 30, 1956, was played. Short speeches were made by Miklós Vásár­herlyi, Chairman of the Committee for Histori­cal Justice and Nagy's Press chief; Sándor Rácz, President of the Budapest Central Work­er's Council in 1956; Imre Mécs, who was sent­enced to death for his role in the Revolution; Tibor Zimányi, representing former inmates of a prison camp closed by Nagy in 1953; Béla Király, Commander of the National Guard in 1956; and Viktor Orbán of the Federation of Young Democrats (FIDESZ). Vásárhelyi said: "The Hungarian people had never shone as brightly in our history as they did during the 1956 Revolution. A brutal out­side intervention trod the Revolution under foot, put an end to our endeavours, our hopes, but it was unable to extinguish the memory of 1956 and of Imre Nagy, who had become the symbol of the turnabout...” Mécs said of the present time: "We are burying a (Communist) system that was bad from the outset, was rejected by the nation, was forced on us, and which failed in every respect." Unlike at past major events in Hungary and other Communist-ruled countries, there was no police surveillance of the funeral. (Continued on page 12) IN THIS ISSUE 1950 Ban on Religious Orders Annulled 2 Billy Graham Threatened with Boycott 3 Cardinal Stopped from Visiting... 4 How Communists Cheer and Boo 'DEFENSIVE’ 5 ’Genocide’ of a Muslim People... 5 THE POLISH PEOPLE SPEAKS 6-7 Moscow Backs Ethiopia Peace Move 6-7 World Derides Peking's Big Lie 8 Foreign Students Injured in Clashes 9 Troops Kill at least 20 Ethnic Turks 10 Eastern Europe 40 Years ago 11 Gunmen Kill Nationalist Leaders 12

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