Mayor committed to retaining Budapest's cultural diversity

Budapest's new leadership is committed to protecting the city's cultural diversity "at a time when the government is tempted to use culture for its own purposes", Mayor Gergely Karacsony told a press conference on Wednesday. At his press conference, marking Culture Day, Karacsony said that a "paradigm shift" was taking place at City Hall itself: the complex now houses not only the activities of the municipality, politicians and administrators, but local residents, too, noting that the Budapest Galeria art gallery will move from the Balna (Whale) building into one of the City Hall's side wings, while the Merlin Theatre situated in the complex will be renovated.