Václav Klaus for Italian journal Nazione Futura with Jacopo Ugolini: “Before European elections”

English Pages, 21. 5. 2024

1) Europe has been experiencing totally uncontrolled illegal immigration for more than a decade. The response of the European institutions has been the redistribution of migrants between countries. We know, however, that this is only a partial and damaging response for several European states. In your opinion, what should be the European Union's response to this problem? Can the Italian Mattei Plan, i.e. an investment plan in Africa, be the solution?

One should differentiate. We shouldn’t be afraid of individual migration, but of mass migration. Not to differentiate these two fundamentally different phenomena is a conceptual mistake. Individual migration is spontaneous and voluntary. Mass migration is organized both on its “supply” and “demand” sides.

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Notes for Budapest: The Anglosphere and Europe (or perhaps "Anglospherism and Europeism"?)

English Pages, 5. 4. 2024

Many thanks for giving me a chance to participate in this very unique gathering, unique as always when it is organized by the Danube Institute, by John and Melissa. When I received the invitation at a conference with the title “The Anglosphere and Europe”, I was not sure I was the right person to be asked to say something relevant on such a topic.

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Václav Klaus: In the Middle of The Age of Wars and Conflicts

English Pages, 23. 2. 2024

Prof. Suver, Distinguished Guests, Ladies and Gentlemen, 

Many thanks for bringing me back to Istanbul and many thanks for including me in this final session of the forum where I have a pleasure of being together with some of my former colleagues. 

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Notes for Munich: Ukraine and Gaza (or perhaps Russia and Israel?). Where to Start?

English Pages, 14. 2. 2024

Good friend of us all asked me to say a few words here this evening about both the Russia-Ukraine conflict and the Israel-Gaza tragedy, with a supplementary question whether these two wars could be over in the next six months. I didn’t dare protest. Let me, therefore, make a few unambitious remarks. Really only remarks.

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Václav Klaus: Introductory Notes for the Vienna Congress Session "Economy"

English Pages, 29. 1. 2024

Many thanks for giving me the opportunity to make introductory remarks to the session which is devoted to the economic side of the rather gloomy world of today. It is definitely not an innovative idea to start with saying that the world economy, and especially the European economy, are not in a good shape these days. This is well-known.

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Václav Klaus: Welcoming and Opening Remarks at Vienna Congress 2024

English Pages, 28. 1. 2024

Ladies and Gentlemen, Distinguished Guests, dear Friends,

It is an honour to be with all of you here today and an even greater honour to have the privilege to greet you at the very beginning of our this year’s Congress. I suppose I am not the only one here who takes coming to Vienna and to Hotel Imperial in the last weekend of January as a constant of my life, as a fixed point in my life program. In the turbulent world of today, we are losing one constant after another, but this one stays – much to my delight – unchanged.

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Václav Klaus: Notes on the Russia-Ukraine War

English Pages, 26. 1. 2024

Many thanks for the invitation. It has made some of us part of the annual political pilgrimage to Davos, which – I have to admit – not all of us support. Not all of us are happy with the radical turn of the Davos Forum into a Mecca of progressivism in recent years.

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Václav Klaus: A Few Words on the Situation in and around Israel

English Pages, 12. 10. 2023

I don't want to make my - entirely voluntary - task of writing a regular Friday note every week any easier by choosing an escape topic. Right now, the topic of the so-called austerity package in the Chamber of Deputies, which is due to be debated today, was a potential candidate. This week, however, I must and want to write about my feeling of despair about the situation in and around Israel and my sadness at the huge and growing number of casualties on both sides of the conflict that has flared up in recent days.

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Václav Klaus: We Need Political World Economy, not Geoeconomics

English Pages, 21. 9. 2023

To make sure I am well understood, I will start with three short introductory remarks:

1. We are quite rationally interested in the development of the world economy because it has a huge impact on the countries where we live, but the term geoeconomics – a fashionable term these days – pretends to be based on a well-established theory, which it is not. Economics is a scientific discipline, geoeconomics is not. This is not a well-defined field of inquiry and studies.

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Václav Klaus: Is it Possible and Meaningful to Aim at Re-Humanizing the World?

English Pages, 1. 9. 2023

Many thanks for inviting me to this exceptionally beautiful part of the world and to this important conference. This is not my first visit to Portugal. I have been here before, four or five times, always for a very short time. On state visits (as Prime Minister and as President of the Czech Republic) or when attending international gatherings. In total, not more than 10-12 days. Never as a tourist. This visit is, therefore, quite special for me.

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