On Thursday in Belgrade, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Péter Szijjártó and his Turkish counterpart Mevlut Cavusoglu discussed energy cooperation between their countries. The two ministers concluded that the future of the Turkish Stream gas pipeline construction is uncertain because of the current Russian-Turkish conflict.
The Visegrád Group (V4) heads of government met South Korean president Park Geun-hye in Prague on Thursday. The Prime Ministers of the Czech Republic, Poland, Hungary and Slovakia (Bohuslav Sobotka, Beata Szydlo, Viktor Orbán and Robert Fico) expressed their wish to deepen cooperation with South Korea.
At the 14th plenary session of the Hungarian Standing Conference (Máért) held in the Várkert Bazár Budapest, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán announced that Hungary would file a challenge against the EU decision on resettlement of migrants based on mandatory quotas.
In an interview with public broadcaster Kossuth Rádió, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán emphasised that Hungary’s position is that all attempts aimed at the “forcible exclusion” of Hungarians from the area of free movement in Europe are unacceptable, as Hungary is the only Schengen Member State which has truly protected the external borders of the Schengen Area, the zone of free movement.
Hungary considers reverse-charge VAT to be one of the most effective tools against cross-border VAT fraud, Minister for National Economy Mihály Varga said a conference organized by the Finance Ministry of the Czech Republic. As Hungary represents a common stance with Czech Finance Minister Andrej Babiš, the Minister was urging the speedy formulation and adoption of a joint EU tax strategy.
On Thursday, Government Spokesperson Zoltán Kovács told public television channel M1 that the presence of armed military police on duty in public areas is “now a necessary part of our lives” under the increased threat of terrorism that Europe has to face.
At a meeting of the Visegrád Group (V4) in Prague, Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán welcomed as very important an initiative whereby the Czech Republic, Poland, Hungary and Slovakia will establish a wider group called “Friends of Schengen”, as part of which every participant can contribute to the reinforcement of external Schengen borders.
At a press conference on Friday, Minister of Justice László Trócsányi announced that Hungary has put forward ten reasons for the abolishment of migrant resettlement quotas.
Advances towards agricultural state subsidies worth some HUF 200 billion will be paid to farmers by the end of the year, the Minister heading the Prime Minister’s Office stated at his press conference held on Thursday in Budapest.
In Belgrade at a two-day conference of the Ministerial Council of the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Péter Szijjártó said that the events in Paris, Ankara, Beirut and Mali – as well as the bomb attack on the Russian airplane above the Sinai peninsula – prove that the time for the final countdown has come; the world’s most brutal terrorist network has launched an attack against the civilised world, and within that against Europe.