The meeting of the Foreign Ministers of the Visegrad Group (V4), the Nordic Council and the Baltic states started in the late afternoon in the High Tatras in Slovakia by Lake Csorba.
EU Commissioner for Energy Union Maroš Šefčovič attends the two-day meeting. Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin will be also present on the second day.
This event is the third summit held with the joint participation of leading diplomats from three regional European alliances – the V4 (Hungary, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Poland), the Nordic Council (Denmark, Iceland, Norway, Finland, Sweden) and the Baltic states (Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia). Two former similar meetings were held in February 2013 in Gdańsk (Poland) and last March in Narva (Estonia). The aim was the strengthening of the joint efforts of the three regional alliances within the European Union (EU) and the discussion of relevant issues.
Energy cooperation, the Eastern Partnership and issues related to the situation in Ukraine are the key issues on the agenda of the summit.
Shortly after the arrival of the guests, a plenary session planned to last an hour and a half started early evening on Thursday, which is followed by dinner.
The programme on Friday will end early afternoon, and the participants of the meeting will hold a joint press conference in the morning.
The host of the meeting held under the Slovak Presidency of the V4 is Miroslav Lajčák, leader of the Slovak diplomacy; Hungary is represented by Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Péter Szijjártó, Warsaw is represented by Minister of Foreign Affairs Grzegorz Schetyna, while the Czech Republic is represented by Deputy Minister Petr Drulák. The members of the Nordic Council – except for Finland – are represented by their Foreign Ministers. Similarly, Ministers of Foreign Affairs arrived to the meeting from the three Baltic states.