PHOTOS: 15 March National Day celebrations started, flag raised near Hungarian Parliament – UPDATED

The national flag was raised with military honours to mark the March 15th national holiday on Saturday in front of Parliament.

15 March celebrations started in Budapest

The flag was raised, and the National Anthem was performed in the presence of President Tamás Sulyok and Speaker of the Parliament László Kövér. Government members, representatives of state and military organisations and the diplomatic corps were also present. The square was full of spectators wearing cockades in the national colours and some waved red-white-green flags.

A hussar procession to the Hungarian National Museum followed, where a ceremony will begin at 10.30 AM in the Museum’s garden and Prime Minister Viktor Orbán will give a speech. From 2 PM to 6 PM, families are invited to the museum to take part in national holiday programmes. Also, the Dome Hall of Parliament and other areas of the building will be open to the public from 10 AM to 6 PM.

15 March marks the beginning of the 1848-49 revolution and war of independence, and was declared a public holiday in 1989.

Hungarian politicians mark 15 March

• János Lázár, Hungary’s transport and construction minister, talked about a “global revolution underway against the liberal elite, which preaches water and drinks wine, never consults but dictates, and lectures on democracy and rule of law, while failing to honour the rights of nations and the will of citizens. (…) Regrettably, there is once again a power centre that feels like behaving and dictating to Hungary just like imperial Vienna used to,” he added on a Friday commemoration. He talked about liberal policies concerning migration, gender and war and national revolutions of the 2020s similar to the revolts 150-200 years ago, which “seem to be forming a global revolution”.
• Former PM Gyurcsány’s party, the Democratic Coalition talked about the coming of the United States of Europe. “But whether we Hungarians will be in it is a big question”, Klára Dobrev, a DK MEP and Gyurcsány’s wife added. They held a torch-lit march yesterday on which Péter Jakab, the former leader of Jobbik, also participated.
• DK leader Ferenc Gyurcsány said “today, we are commemorating great people, great Hungarians, whose own lives they saw as less important than the freedom of their people”. “We are among the fighters. Honour and integrity for the cause of freedom!”
• Standing up for human dignity “remains our freedom fight here in Budapest”, Gergely Karácsony, the city’s mayor, said in a speech on Saturday. “A free society means that its citizens stand up for each other’s freedom as well as their own,” he said.
• UPDATE: Culture and innovation minister Balázs Hankó talked about “the new empire wants to erase the foundations of our national identity and rewrite the order of the created world,” the minister said, underlining the need for Hungarians’ strength and “faith in the Creator”.

Read also:

• What do Hungarians celebrate on 15 March?
• Five historic March 15th celebrations in Hungary