CHINA: Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban meets Premier Wen Jiabao and gives keynote speech on final day of Shanghai Expo 2010

Record ID: 858761

  • Title: CHINA: Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban meets Premier Wen Jiabao and gives keynote speech on final day of Shanghai Expo 2010
  • Date: 1st November 2010
  • Summary: ORBAN WALKING INTO TO SHANGHAI EXPO 2011 CONFERENCE HALL ORBAN AND OTHERS WALKING TOWARDS SEATS IN CONFERENCE ROOM AUDIENCE PUTTING ON HEADPHONES ORBAN WALKING UP STEPS ORBAN WALKING TOWARDS PODIUM AND SHAKING HANDS WITH MASTER OF CEREMONIES
  • Embargoed: 16th November 2010 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: China
  • City:
  • Country: China
  • Topics: International Relations
  • Reuters ID: LVAE25GZR0PZ3PYYYJCZ41AGGSNC
  • Aspect Ratio:
  • Story Text: Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban met Chinese Premier Wen Jiaobao in Shanghai on Sunday (October 31), on the final day of the Shanghai Expo 2010.
    Wen greeted Orban in a hotel in the city centre before the two sat down for bilateral talks.
    Earlier in the day Orban attended the opening plenary session of a summit on urban innovation and sustainable development, designed to highlight the 2010 Expo's theme "Better City, Better Life".
    In a keynote speech entitled: "Hungary's Contribution to the Sustainable Urban Development," Orban stressed the importance of building better cities.
    "Ladies and gentlemen when we speak about the cities, we speak about the future. Because if we speak about the future of cities, we are speaking about the future of the mankind," he said.
    Later on Sunday, officials from China, the UN and the Bureau International des Expositions issued the "Shanghai Declaration," which reflects the aspirations of participants to contribute to more sustainable urban development, the official Expo website said.
    Shanghai has made unprecedented efforts to impress with its Expo, a world fair which has in recent years largely dropped off the world's radar.
    China says it spent $4.2 billion on preparing for the event - double what it spent at the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
    It has been the most expensive and largest Expo to date, and local media reported the true cost was closer to $58 billion, including infrastructure.
    Orban said the Asian giant was at the centre of geopolitical changes taking place in the world.
    "New power engines are emerging, new ideas and concepts of economic policy become dominant. Now it is perfectly clear to all of us that the world is undergoing very rapid and deep changes, and that China plays a key role in these changes," he said.
    On Saturday (October 30) evening, Orban visited the Hungary pavilion, which has the theme "Harmony, Creativity and Hospitality".
    The pavilion, which is surrounded by wooden rods and tubes with running water, has had almost 6 million visitors since the Expo opened at the beginning of May, pavilion officials said.
    According to official figures, over 70 million people had visited the Expo by Sunday 24th, meeting authorities' target, and putting China's Expo well ahead of the Osaka 1970's previous record of 64 million visitors, the official Xinhua news agency reported.
    At its peak in mid-October, the Shanghai Expo had over one million visitors in one day, almost double the originally estimated maximum capacity of 600,000 people, the report said.
    Visitors have had to endure waits as long as eight hours to see popular pavilions like China's or Saudi Arabia's.
    Once the Expo closes, most pavilions, including Hungary's, will be torn down in line with World Expo regulations.
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