After the speech of Deputy Mayor Dr. Gábor Erős, International Director János Kovács, the moderator of the ceremony, gave the floor to the main foreign VIP guest, H.E. Mr. Morteza Moradian, Ambassador of the Islamic Republic of Iran to Budapest. His Excellency’s participation at the opening ceremony carried special actuality, since the guest of honor of this year’s Avicenna Christmas Fair is “Persia”, which means that about half of the exotic products at the fair came directly from Iran. Ambassador Moradian praised the stable, always problem-free and historically long lasting Hungarian-Iranian relations based on mutual respect. He also highlighted an actual event of great importance such as the upcoming Ministerial meeting on the agenda of the Hungarian-Iranian Joint Economic Committee, that seems to be embedded for by the Avicenna Group’s Christmas Fair, which carries both cultural and commercial values.
The next high-ranking speaker was Mr. Miklós Bornemisza, Vice President of the International and Foreign Economic Cabinet of the Budapest Chamber of Commerce and Industry (BKIK). Mr. Bornemisza also praised the excellent relations between the BKIK and the Avicenna Group, and later even suggested that the Budapest Chamber would be glad to take on the role of co-organizer at the next year’s Avicenna Christmas fair.
Professor Dr. László Rosivall, PhD, DSc, FERA, FAPS, the former Rector of Semmelweis University, also played an important role with his speech, as he himself was present at the launch of Avicenna International College 28 years ago. He noted that in the beginning, the main goal of this institution’s activity was to attract and professionally embrace talented Iranian students who wanted to build their future in the field of medicine. As a result of the continuous development of the Avicenna group, students from around two dozen different nations study now within the walls of the patinated educational institution built in 1898, which now not only offers active university preparation programs, but effectively operates an English-language high school that has recently won a full-fledged, long-term ERASMUS partnership.