Historian Krisztián Ungváry, Mayor of First District, Márta Naszályi V., and Pál Tutsek, editor of Deutsche Welle, rejected press reports in recent days that the German public broadcasting company had “apologized” for its report on the renovation of the Buda Castle.
“Deutsche Welle only expressed regret that someone had misunderstood what was said in the report. In fact, Deutsche Welle’s broadcast did not contain any allegations justifying an apology,” they said.
In a recent post, we wrote about Deutsche Welle having made a report on Hungary linking the reconstruction of the Buda Castle by the Orbán government to Horthy-era nationalism and the tragedy of the Holocaust. The video was considered outrageous by the Association of Residents of Buda Castle, and they immediately wrote an open letter to the media company highlighting the report’s historical inaccuracies. As a result, DW included a short text along with the video in which they seemingly apologized for the report having caused concern to some viewers and which might have seemed one-sided.
“The historical reference in this report has caused concern for some viewers. We would like to make it clear: Nazi Germany is responsible for the enforced transportation and murder of hundreds of thousands of Hungarian Jews. We apologize if the report created a different impression and appeared one-sided,” they wrote.
In the pro-government media, this statement was interpreted in a way in which they claimed that the media company apologized for the account, but according to Deutsche Welle, they did not.
Featured photo illustration by Csaba Jászai/MTVA
