Transatlantic Agenda: Common Values, Concerns

Karen P. Hughes
Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs
Remarks at Central European University
Budapest, Hungary
October 1, 2007

The Transatlantic Agenda: Common Values, Common Concerns

Thank you, Dr. Borkros for your warm welcome. It's wonderful to be back in this lovely city and this inspiring country, which is such a powerful example of democratic transformation.

I want to thank Ambassador April Foley for developing this important series and asking me to be the lead-off speaker. April is working tirelessly to build and strengthen the close friendship and many ties between America and Hungary. In this world of change and challenge, our strong transatlantic alliance is more important than ever before.

Ours is an alliance of values. We have a shared unshakeable belief in human freedom, justice, rule of law, limits on the power of the state, freedom of speech, assembly and worship –and an enduring conviction that every human being has dignity and worth value.

Ours is an alliance of interests. We work together to build security, confront terrorism, expand economic opportunity for both our peoples. American firms have invested more than $9 billion in Hungary since 1989, making us the fourth largest investor in your country. Our two-way trade has grown more than 13 percent in the last five years and last year, totaled about 3.8 billion dollars.

And ours is an alliance of outreach, seeking for ever-increasing numbers of the people the freedom and opportunities the peoples of America and Europe enjoy.

This alliance of values, interest, and outreach forms the strong core of America's deep friendship with Hungary. We also have fundamental ties of family–there are 1.5 million Americans of Hungarian descent.

The first cracks in the Iron Curtain came here in Hungary, beginning a cascade of freedom that liberated millions. And Hungary's own experience in overcoming oppression and peacefully building the institutions of democracy is a powerful example at a time when many nations and peoples are struggling to secure their own freedom. As President Bush said when he visited Eastern Europe in 2001, "You have proven that communism need not be followed by chaos, that great oppression can end in true reconciliation, and that the promise of freedom is stronger than the habit of fear."

America appreciates and applauds the leadership role and many responsibilities–responsibilities beyond its size–that Hungary is taking on to promote freedom in today's world. In Afghanistan, Hungary is leading a provincial reconstruction team in Afghanistan's Baghlan province, helping a country so brutally repressed under the Taliban to begin to rebuild after 30 years of war and chaos. Hungary is working side-by-side with the United States and our allies to bring stability to Iraq to help people long repressed by Saddam Hussein begin to govern themselves and build the institutions of security and civil society. This is not easy work, but it is necessary work and we appreciate Hungary's vital contributions, from the deployment of troops to the donation of materials. Regionally, you are also promoting peace and stability, and assisting the nations of the former Yugoslavia to become better integrated in Euro-Atlantic institutions. And even more broadly, Hungary is looking with us at how to assist democratic transitions in countries such as Cuba and Belarus so their peoples there can achieve basic human rights and freedoms.

The United States is committed to a strong and constructive bilateral relationship with Hungary–a genuine two-way relationship with respect and responsibilities on both sides. The United States is fulfilling the commitments made by President Bush when he visited here last year:

* The return of the Tancsics building complex, which is so closely associated with Hungary's struggle for freedom and democracy; and

* The expansion of the U.S. visa waiver program.

I'm pleased to report that since the President's visit, the U.S. Congress has revised the visa waiver legislation to allow more flexibility, and we anticipate and look forward to Hungary's inclusion. As an American, I am able to visit this beautiful country of Hungary without a visa, and we want the same to be true for our Hungarian friends to visit America.

Hungary and America are joined together in the great cause of expanding freedom–helping others to experience and enjoy the rights all human beings were intended to have. Both our countries have learned that freedom is not something to be hoarded, but something to be shared, so that others also have the hope of a better life.

I was working in the White House in 2001 when President Bush made his first trip to eastern Europe. I remember working on his speech and sitting in the West Wing talking with Dan Fried, who is now the Assistant Secretary for Europe at the State Department. We talked about how the dark, restricted, oppressive Iron Curtain had been replaced by open doors and windows. And as I prepared for this visit, I thought of the powerful words and ideas President Bush expressed: "The Iron Curtain is no more. Now, we plan and build the house of freedom–whose doors are open to all of Europe's peoples and whose windows look out to global challenges beyond."

The people of Hungary spent the long years of the Cold War stuck on the wrong side of a great divide, but the wall is no more, and we no longer have to look at the world in the old divided way. Hungary no longer has to choose between strong relations with Europe and strong relations with America or whether to look east or west. The world of open doors and windows is a world of broad horizons.

America welcomes a strong European Union. The U.S. and EU cooperate consistently in ways that benefit both America and Hungary. Our security, our commerce, our values, are interconnected, interwoven like threads in a tapestry.

We've seen many recent signs of our growing cooperation:

* Excellent progress at the US/EU Summit on improving the transatlantic climate for business.

* A new air transport agreement that opens new opportunities to American and European carriers. We expect this will increase transatlantic passengers by 25 million, generate $15 billion in consumer economic benefits and create 80,000 new jobs.

* We're speeding the development of new lower-pollution and lower carbon-based technologies and accelerating investment in cleaner, more efficient use of fossil and renewable sources of energy.

* We've strengthened our protection of intellectual property rights so that both Hungarian and U.S. products can grow in the fields of the future such as bio- and nano-technology.

* And we have agreed to work with Russia toward its accession to the World Trade Organization and its full embrace of free markets.

In a world of open doors and windows, Hungary no longer has to choose between good relations with the United States and its interests with Russia. This is based on the dated ideas about "zones of influence" which don't really apply in today's globally inter-connected world. For example, when it comes to energy security, it's in Hungary's interest to diversify rather than limiting itself to one source or another. Seeking diverse sources of energy for ourselves and urging our Euro-atlantic allies to do the same is not a matter of zones of influence but of sound energy policy.

Diversification makes sense, both to protect people from arbitrary acts of one provider and to encourage competition and the better pricing it brings. Events like the Nabucco Gas Pipeline Conference your Government hosted at Parliament earlier last month show that Hungary understands that promoting competition in the energy field is important for customers and for national security. This is another example of Hungary looking past ancient boundaries and toward the common ground of values and strategic interests that we share.

Hungary is a great center of democracy. As members of the family of democratic nations, we have a responsibility to help others–fighting disease, poverty, global warming, helping with peace in the Middle East, and, closer to home on Europe's periphery, we have a responsibility to help the Georgians and the Kosovars, and work with Russia in partnership where we can.

Our open societies have created the conditions for incredible progress in the last decade. That openness has also made it possible for countless people-to-people connections between Hungary and America to thrive. These human ties of friendship knit us together–exchanges of students, teachers, members of faith communities, professional organizations, Rotary Clubs, and art and cultural groups.

One of my top priorities since I assumed my position 2 years ago has been to expand America's education and exchange programs around the world. We know these people-to-people programs work, and I am convinced that they are the single best way to build positive, lasting relationships with other nations. Almost every single participant says afterward, "It changed my life." More than 130 world leaders have been participants in our programs–including the new prime minister in Great Britain, the new president of France, and the newly elected President of Turkey.

We need to ensure that we continue bringing the best and the brightest from your country to learn about America. And I want to make sure our young people come here to learn about your culture and historic intellectual contributions–like your brave and noble champion of Democracy, Kossuth, who eloquently said on his visit to America in 1852, "All for the people and all by the people. Nothing about the people without the people. That is Democracy, and that is the ruling tendency of the spirit of our age."

American President Abraham Lincoln later would echo that theme when he spoke of a government "of the people, by the people and for the people." Today, you can find many reminders of Kossuth's impact on America–there is a Kossuth County in the state of Iowa, towns named Kossuth in the states of Indiana, Ohio, and Mississippi, and a Kossuth Post Office in Pennsylvania--plus statues and plaques in New York, Cleveland, Akron, New Orleans, and Washington, DC. Historians will tell you that Kossuth was greeted with wild enthusiasm across the country when he visited America a century and a half ago. He was only the second foreign leader (second to Lafayette) to address a joint session of Congress. Kossuth even started a fashion craze in the U.S.–the moustache-less beard with top hat. A bust that now sits proudly in the U.S. Capitol reads, "Louis Kossuth, Father of Hungarian Democracy."

We must ensure that future generations of Americans know his name as well as people in the 1850s did.

In the aftermath of the terrorist attacks on my country on September 11, 2001, expanding our people-to-people exchange programs has become even more important. More than 30 different studies looked at America's public diplomacy efforts after 9/11, and almost all of them agreed that one of the best things we could do to improve our relationships overseas was to invest in building these programs, and we are doing just that. The year before I started at the State Department we had 27,000 participants; this year, we'll have more than 40,000 and I'm working on a budget that I hope ,with the help of Congress, will increase it to more than 50,000. This year, the U.S. and Hungary renewed our successful bilateral Fulbright Program which allows professors, scientists, and students to share research and study in each other's countries and enrich both our societies in the process.

We're expanding cultural exchanges, welcoming Hungarian musicians and drama groups, dancers and visual artists, to the United States, and in May, Sando Benko and his Dixieland Band played his 50th anniversary concert here in Hungary–with a letter of congratulations from President Bush delivered by Ambassador Foley.

Hungarians have been equally enthusiastic in welcoming American artists like Branford Marsalis and the New York Philharmonic.

We're expanding our outreach to young people. Ambassador Foley told me about a wonderful public diplomacy program the embassy here has sponsored, bringing young people from different ethnic backgrounds from the Balkans and other nearby countries to meet each other, engage in dialogue, learn tolerance–and respect.

Another form of outreach is what I call the "diplomacy of deeds" –the concrete ways in which our humanitarian and development initiatives are improving lives around the world, particularly in areas that people care the most about–education, health, and economic opportunity. I've been impressed by the growing concern in Hungary for women's empowerment. At the United Nations General Assembly meeting in New York last week, I attended a breakfast for women leaders. I sat next to Hungary's Foreign Minister Goncz–she said while women have equal rights, they don't yet have equal opportunities. That's an astute observation that applies in many places. Ambassador Foley is working with friends throughout the social spectrum in Hungary and with State Department women's leadership programs to empower women and encourage greater participation. It is another example of how, together, the talents and experience of Hungarians and Americans combine to make tangible improvements in people's lives. I was thrilled to participate in the Komen Foundation's Global Advocate Summit here in Budapest this past weekend and also take part last night in what has become an annual tradition–the Annual Bridge Walk for Breast Cancer Awareness. When we work together in the world to save and improve lives, we are doing the right thing–and making friends in the process.

Our transatlantic partnership is a positive example of how people on different sides of the ocean can work together for the greater good. I like to describe this work as waging peace. And I use the word waging very intentionally, because I think we have to be intentional about it. It's not something that just happens. It takes commitment and effort and outreach. And it's going to take time. I keep a little clip from a Chinese proverb on my desk and it talks about planting the seeds of trees under whose shade you may never sit. And I sometimes feel like that's what I'm doing as I travel the world–that I hope I am planting a few seeds.

The work we do together in our transatlantic relationship–whether in international security, trade and commerce, or culture and art–is building a safer and more prosperous world, and it is my fervent hope and belief that our children and grandchildren will enjoy the shade.

Thank you all for having me here today–I look forward to your questions.

ENDS

More: Latest World News | Top World News | World Digest | Archives

© Scoop Media