Added: Nov 23, 2008
From: MaxwellsDemon2000
Duration: 0:25
Lech Kaczynski, July 06, 2008:"It is not the first time Poland takes part in the world exhibition. The Poles, although not Poland as a state, took part in successive such events since the first exhibition held in London in 1851. For 120 years the successive exhibitions presented an overview of civilisational achievements. This began to change after the year 1970 when the events started presenting also selected problems and ways of coping with them. Such is also this year's EXPO in Saragossa and I want to congratulate the city on its success. I also congratulate the authorities of Aragon and Spain. The organisation of such an exhibition, or rather winning the right to stage it, is a great success. It is a success scored even before the actual opening of the EXPO. I think that the success will prove even greater after the EXPO ends.This year's EXPO is devoted to water and balanced development, i.e. issues related to natural environment and parallel to the climate change issue. It is the key problem at present and it was not easy to bring this home to the minds of elites and nations. We have scored considerable successes in this respect. However, the problem is very complicated. In today's world development is asymmetric, some large countries started to make up for arrears a dozen-odd years ago and this can conflict with the principle of balanced development. The balanced development programme is necessary but it should try to reconcile and balance many global interests. We, Europeans have our own interests and others also have their own interests. The richer countries, including Europe, have their interests but we must lose sight of the interests of the poorer countries. This is very important. Solidarity between the richer and poorer is very important, just as the transfer of technology and going beyond purely commercial attitude in some cases. Also creativity with regard to technology and social solutions is very important.Poland's presentation at this year's EXPO is held under the motto Create and Care. Creativity is a feature that is needed for any development and in today's world it is the foundation of development. Poland wants to make creativity the fundamental vehicle for its development and has embarked upon the road leading to this. Creativity of the Poles finds expression in their spirit of enterprise: there is one firm in Poland for roughly every two families. It may be attributable to our individualistic nature. It may also explain the fact that Poland scored the relatively greatest success among the countries which underwent a systemic transformation. Creativity also means inventing new methods, new technologies and new social solutions which I mentioned earlier.The second part of the motto is Care. No development and no nation can do without values. The call for Care has ties to the call for solidarity, to the Christian roots of Polish culture dating back 1,000 years and of European culture over the last 2,000 years. And this is not my creed, it is a fact. The words of the Gospel that were often repeated by John Paul 2 and that urge us to carry others' burdens define well our basic duties related to values. From this viewpoint Saragossa is a perfect place to host an EXPO devoted to a balanced development and water. We have here a culture that has existed for 2,000 years. We have here good times and bad times. Madam minister mentioned here the Poles who fought under Napoleon against Spain. I can assure you that the Poles who fought against the Spanish, but who often displayed solidarity with them, fought for Poland's freedom. At that point in history we could pin our hopes on Napoleon only. One can say that the Spanish won the war while the Poles lost it, because Napoleon lost. But the idea of a free Poland survived and 100 years later Poland regained independence. Today Poland is the sixth largest EU country, right after Spain. We are very satisfied with our EU membership. Spain's development is a model for many Poles. We want to live in a united Europe, but one that continues to be built around values. And we want to take part in everything that matters in Europe, including the protection of the environment and balanced development."(Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Poland, www.msz.gov.pl )
Channel: News
Rating: 5.00 (2 ratings) Views: 247 Comments: 1
drschnaggels Says:
Nov 23, 2008 - TeeHee :)