RMDSZ believes extremist AUR party aimed to exploit the salt mine investigation in Praid (Parajd) to provoke Szeklerland, as it has done on several previous occasions. Continue reading
“The Poles can count on us in every noble cause,” decades and centuries have proven that no matter how history unfolds, no matter how “they try to pit us against each other, we belong together and we will continue to belong together,” said the state secretary responsible for church and ethnic relations at a memorial service held on Tuesday, at the site of a Polish bus accident that occurred 23 years ago on the outskirts of Balatonberény, at the southern shores of Lake Balaton.
Miklós Soltész recalled that the accident involving Polish pilgrims on their way to Medjugorje (Bosnia and Herzegovina) claimed 20 lives and left many seriously injured. The survivors and their relatives suffered physically and mentally, as did the “professionals” who participated in the rescue efforts at the time, he added. The State Secretary also recalled that a Polish child who was trapped under the bus was kept alive for hours by firefighters, doctors, and police officers until he could be freed.
Soltész thanked not only those who participated in the rescue, but also the Catholic Church, the county governor, the surrounding communities, and the Polish community in Hungary for making a pilgrimage to the site every year.
Photo: MTI/Vasvári Tamás
Marcin Bobinski, consul at the Polish Embassy in Budapest, who began his speech in Polish and continued in Hungarian, thanked everyone on behalf of the Polish state for the fact that 23 years ago, at the site of the accident, where a beautiful memorial now stands, Hungarian firefighters, paramedics, police officers, and doctors provided so much help to the pilgrims in distress.
At the commemoration, wreaths were laid at the memorial by representatives of the State Secretariat, local governments, the police, disaster management, the ambulance service, and Polish organizations, and the event concluded with a joint prayer.
1. lipca 2002 – W katastrofie polskiego autokaru z pielgrzymami na Węgrzech zginęło 19 osób, a 32. zostały ranne pic.twitter.com/XSf7UalL6f
— Krzysztof Kotowski (@KoteuszKotowski) July 1, 2025
The memorial erected at the site of the accident is a replica of the statue of the Virgin Mary in Medjugorje, made from the same marble as the original by the Italian family who created it.
Featured Image: MTI/Vasvári Tamás