Ambassador Tufo on Victory of Democracy in Yugoslavia
AMBASSADOR PETER TUFO
"OPENING ADDRESS"
Central European University
Vigado Concert Hall
Opening Ceremony
October 10
As American Ambassador, I am very pleased to join you in celebrating
this opening event of CEU's academic year.
We live in a world of amazing changes and eternal promise. Nothing
demonstrates that more clearly than the incredible events we saw
unfold in Yugoslavia during the past week.
First of all, I understand that there are 36 students from Yugoslavia
at CEU this year.
I applaud them and the brighter future that this extraordinary victory
represents for them and for all the people of Yugoslavia.
I had the opportunity to congratulate Yugoslav students for their role
in the democratic movement during that extraordinary night last
Thursday, when they were on the streets in front of the Yugoslav
Embassy here in Budapest, and their compatriots were on the streets of
Belgrade. They gave me this T-shirt as a momento! (opens shirt to
reveal Otpor student protest T-shirt).
We should recognize the on-going efforts of the Office of Yugoslav
Affairs, headed by Ambassador William Montgomery and based at our
Embassy. This group coordinates U.S. Government assistance to
Yugoslavia.
Also of great significance was the role of Hungary in this
extraordinary change of government. Through the Szeged Process,
Hungary was a herald of truth to a country where truth was often
unwelcome.
A dark cloud has lifted. The people have taken their country back with
nothing but courage, principle, and patriotism.
The United States applauds the victory of President Kostunica. We note
his assurance that "a wave of democratic change will sweep across"
Yugoslavia, and his stated belief that "Democracy is about ballots,
not bullets."
We look forward, with our allies, to lifting the sanctions once the
democratic authorities are in place, and providing all the assistance
we can to a democratic Yugoslavia, to build the economic and civil
institutions that will allow democracy to endure.
This is an extraordinary victory for the people of Yugoslavia, who
endured oppression and deprivation, who saw through the propaganda,
who took their country back with nothing but courage, principle and
patriotism. They will now define the shape of their future. They have
said they want to live in a normal country, at peace with its
neighbors.
This is a victory for all Southeast Europe. As long as Mr. Milosevic
was in power, the danger of more violence in Bosnia, Kosovo and
Montenegro remained high. A dark cloud has lifted. Prospects for
enduring stability in the Balkans have greatly improved.
This is a victory for the steady, persistent position of the
international community. Had the world allowed Milosevic to build a
greater Serbia through conquest and ethnic cleansing the people of
Yugoslavia could not have won today.
President Kostunica is clearly a Serbian patriot. He is also
profoundly devoted to the rule of law and to constitutional
procedures.
The U.S. has profound national interests in stabilizing Europe and
permitting it to be united, not divided; all democratic, not partly
so; and free of ethnic cleansing and slaughter.
As Yugoslavia's new leaders work to build a truly democratic society,
we will move with our European allies to lift sanctions. We have
joined with the European Union in pledging to lift sanctions once the
democratic authorities are in place. We will keep our promise.
Now is the time to stay the course and stick with the Yugoslav people
who have won their freedom. It is the time to build the economic and
civil institutions that will allow democracy to endure, reconciliation
and cooperation to develop and the economy to grow.
We look forward, with our partners, to providing all the assistance we
can to a democratic Yugoslavia. We recognize that they have inherited
from Milosevic a host of economic, social and institutional problems.
We look forward to welcoming the new Serb Government into key regional
and global institutions, and we look forward to welcoming the Serb
people into the trans-Atlantic community of free and prosperous
nations. We owe it to the Yugoslav people to reward the decision they
have made.
The developments of this week are another enormous step towards the
creation of a Europe without walls, wholly at peace and fully free,
and a victory for those who love freedom everywhere.
No institutions are more important to the realization of the promise
of democracy than the university and the legal system. Few
universities are better placed than CEU to help make that promise a
reality for both.
Just over eleven years ago, as the walls came crashing down Europe, we
should not forget that the idea that eventually became the Central
European University was born in the minds of a few men of vision,
meeting in Dubrovnik, in the former Yugoslavia. Men like George Soros
and Miklos Vasarhelyi.
As dizzying as those changes and these more recent ones have been, in
a way their roots can be traced further back -- back to 1953 Berlin
and 1956 Budapest, to the Prague Spring and the Velvet Revolution, to
the small steps forward and steps back that inexorably led to the
great events of 1989, and the crumbling of the wall.
Our own American Revolution, more than two centuries ago, only became
real to the eyes of the Western world on October 19, 1781, when
General George Washington accepted the surrender of the British forces
at Yorktown, Virginia. As the defeated British marched out between
twin lines of American soldiers to stack their arms, their pipers
struck up the tune "The World Turned Upside Down."
In the last decade, the world we all knew for the last fifty years,
has also turned upside down, and -- as this week's events in
Yugoslavia are bearing out -- it continues to do so. The words of the
old Chinese curse, "May you live in interesting times," have rarely
had a stronger resonance than now.
Over the last decade, CEU has played an enormously important role in
conceptualizing and then helping to develop a trained corps of
scholars and professionals, grounded in democratic values and
dedicated to the creation of an open society operating under the rule
of law, throughout Central and Eastern Europe, to the betterment of
all its nations and citizens.
There can be no greater calling than working to liberate and enlarge
the minds of the next generation of leaders and thinkers. At CEU, you
are helping to secure the present and to build the future, for
yourselves and your neighbors.
From Dubrovnik to Prague to Budapest, CEU has grown in less than 10
years to almost 800 students from over forty countries. The University
also occupies an advantageous central position in the developing
educational equation of the region.
Formally recognized by the Hungarian Ministry of Culture and Education
in 1995, CEU is also very much an American University, chartered by
the Board of Regents of the State of New York in 1996.
With your impressive library, excellent faculty, talented student
body, and forward looking program of study in the social sciences,
environmental sciences, and the humanities, CEU is exceptionally
well-placed to help service not only the needs of your own students,
drawn from the region and beyond, but of your sister institutions
throughout the region, including Hungary.
The brain trust that George Soros assembled to create what eventually
became CEU, designed an institution that would work toward meeting the
perceived and projected needs of the region.
As Hungary and its neighbors in Central and South Eastern Europe seek
ways to move closer to each other on many levels, an American
University like CEU - positioned as it is with a foot on each side of
the Atlantic, is particularly well-placed to support and facilitate
those efforts.
What the most pressing academic needs of the region in the next ten
years will be - you can help to assess, and to address.
Some of the subjects are already visible - there is a clear need for
expertise in Information Technology policy, and Regulatory Policy, and
Intellectual Property Rights.
An institution with strong credentials in teaching and researching
international relations, like CEU, could clearly contribute to the
needs of many Central European countries, which have yet to establish
diplomatic academies, or schools of Foreign Service, for
professionally focused courses in Area Studies and diplomatic
tradecraft.
U.S.-based American universities also continue to seek ways to expand
their international contacts. CEU could see its own future either as a
competitor in that game or as a facilitator and partner.
I am not trying to suggest answers to questions that I am sure the
administration of CEU has long since set itself. I just want to
underscore the great importance of the subject, not only to the future
of this university, but to the academic, social, and intellectual
vitality of the region.
To the members of the New Class of 2000/2001 -- you're all certainly
in the right place at the right time. Welcome, and make the most of
your time here. Thank you.
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