Distinguished bereaved family, one-time comrades, friends, and all present, we are all gathered together today to bid farewell to Colonel Zoltán Mátyus, a great loss of the Hungarian Defence Forces and all of us. Broken-hearted by grief, but slowly acquiescing to the grim will of Fate, we have come together at the urn of Colonel Zoltán Mátyus to say final farewell to the beloved husband, father, brother, family member, friend, our comrade and one-time commander. “If only I could live among you a little more, However, fate has ordered otherwise. I’m parting now to take my final rest, Deep down, I will feel no pain.” We are standing here with a sinking heart in awe. Death irrevocably breaks the ties that connect people, and along these broken ties inconceivable emptiness remains leaving a loss that cannot be superseded in our hearts. At such times, we contemplate all the things we would have liked to tell him, all the things we would have liked to do together and live through. However, death after an illness carried away the chance to fulfil all these. Distinguished bereaved family, colleagues, comrades, family members and friends, Colonel Mátyus was born in Budapest on 3rd January, 1954. As a child he was attracted to military life, he always wanted to be a soldier. In 1972, he was accepted as a cadet to Zalka Máté Military Technical College. Following his basic training in Debrecen, he became an active and dedicated student. In 1976, he graduated as an air defence artillery officer with merit. He was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant on 20th August, 1976. What it meant for him to be a soldier and to take an officer’s oath is best indicated by his words to his family members in Kossuth Square after his induction ceremony - with tears in his eyes: “I do really love my country”. He was very proud of his achievement. He had his first officer’s post at the calibration team of the Air Defence Training Centre. From 1981 to 1984, he served as a deputy company commander in the personnel of Hinterland Defence Command, then he was accepted to Zrínyi Miklós Military Academy, where he graduated with flying colours. From 1987, he worked at the Department of Theoretical Politics. In the meantime, in 1986 he successfully passed the advanced-level examination in Russian (at that time he did not even think how important episode it would be in his later military life). By 1990, he had already acquired language skills in English. As a result, from 1992 he served as a liaison officer in the newly-formed American-Hungarian Military Working Group. 1994 brought a radical change in his life, as he was deployed as a UN military observer in the United Nations Iraq-Kuwait Observation Mission. (“My dear Laci … I was lying in the desert and realized that I was part of history”, he told me later.) Soon after his return home in 1996, he served as a military advisor in the OSCE mission in Nagorno-Karabakh. Having completed this mission, from 1997 he worked in various positions at the Joint Operation Centre of the General Staff, thereby he was continually monitoring the Hungarian peacekeeping missions. In July 2002, he commenced his one-and-a-half-year deployment in Kosovo in UNMIK as the commander of the UN-NATO liaison team in Pristina region. After he came home, he was appointed Commander of the Hungarian Defence Forces Peace Support Training Centre, which came to existence on 27th May, 2004 as an independent unit. He commanded the training centre for five years. Colonel Mátyus was a permanent member of the NATO peace support operations preparation and training working group, which makes recommendations for the development and implementation of peace support training courses for NATO and PfP countries. He was promoted to Colonel in March 2007. Under his leadership, the HDF PSTC introduced and established the methodology of the national individual training of peacekeepers. He earned imperishable merits in the organization and implementation of international courses, and in their later accreditation. Even today, the curricula, international programmes and training methodology developed under his command serve as the basis for the national peacekeeping training. We may rightfully declare that Colonel Mátyus is a crucial figure in the establishment of the Hungarian institutionalized peacekeeping training. The centre gained its first, still determinative UN accreditation for the most successful international training course of the Hungarian Defence Forces, the International Military Observers’ Course under the command of Colonel Mátyus in 2007. ...

... His expertise and international reputation granted guarantee for the high-quality implementation of training. His experience is still often invoked for the solution of specific mission tasks, therefore, between December 2007 and July 2008, he served as the contingent commander of the Sarajevo EUFOR mission; then in 2009 he worked at the NATO HQ in Afghanistan. Colonel Mátyus always treated his subordinates humanely understanding their problems and helping them to overcome their difficulties. He was extremely enthusiastic about training, education and learning. Once, while we were having a conversation, he told me “the most splendid thing is to invest in training, education and learning; that investment has the highest rate of return in life, and, luckily, if we give others knowledge, we will not have less of it, on the contrary, we will become more in doing so”. At other times, he was talking about his belief in progress only to be accomplished by learning. He retired on 1st July, 2010, but instead of resting, he sought new challenges, and, as an individual applicant, he proved to be worthy of filling an advisory position in the UN mission in Georgia. The period he spent in Tbilisi and Geneva was an appropriate closure of his active military career. The military career of Colonel Mátyus is exemplary and worth following for us all. During his service he received decorations and recognitions 14 times. Apart from peacekeeping service medals, he was decorated by the United States of America Land Forces, which he kept in special esteem. “If only I could live among you a little more, However, fate has ordered otherwise. His everyday life was gleaming with serenity, joy, love, smile, empathy and calmness. His natural behaviour, and his quest for good and right set an example to follow for many. He constantly searched the possibilities of life even when he was ill, which he had become aware of two and a half years before. In his continuous struggle, he never let the hope of recovery go. He was planning journeys, and when his health permitted, he spent some time skiing. He was especially keen on swimming – he was extremely proud of having been a student of Olympic champion Éva Székely. He particularly enjoyed Mozart and Beethoven’s music. During his last months, his state demanded constant care. His wife, Svetlana’s unwavering attendance and her tenacious presence relieved his pains and provided solace and strength. “If only I could live among you a little more, However, fate has ordered otherwise. I’m parting now to take my final rest, Deep down, I will feel no pain.” Colonel Sir, Zoltán, or, as we used to call you among ourselves informally: CHIEF, Your bereaved family, your wife, your children, your siblings, your comrades, and friends, those who respected you and all present are bidding their final farewell. Grateful for your service, your homeland, Hungary and the Hungarian Defence Forces, the national and international community of peacekeepers and the personnel of the Peace Support Training Centre are all saying farewell. May you rest in peace. We will preserve your memory as long as we live.