Central Europe is gaining in importance, it is in an ascending phase, its significance is increasing, and the growth centre of the entire European Union is shifting in an easterly direction, towards Central Europe, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said on Wednesday in Kidricevo in Slovenia, at the foundation stone laying ceremony marking the beginning of the construction of the Pince-Cirkovce power line.
He said he had read books written at the beginning of the 2010s about what the decade between 2010 and 2020 would be like. He read them in order to understand “the limits of the human mind’s capacity for predicting the future”.
These books said nothing about the US turnaround hallmarked by the name of President Donald Trump, Brexit, the migration crisis or the epidemic. This clearly shows that “we must be careful if we want to predict the significance of something in an historical perspective,” he said.
Nonetheless, what is happening here will feature in the history books that will be written about the years between 2020 and 2030. This is not only about a simple energy connection, but about “a connection between two important countries, implemented at an important time,” he stated.
Mr Orbán said Central Europe is in an ascending phase, it is gaining in strength, its significance is increasing, and the growth centre of the entire European Union is shifting in an easterly direction, towards Central Europe.
For a long time now, the EU has no longer been just about the German-French axis; Western Europe’s relations with the Central European countries are at least as important as German-French relations are, he pointed out.
He took the view that the whole of the Central European region is gaining in strength, and if a region is gaining in strength, then large and powerful countries will try to gain influence there, and as a result, the truly important countries and regions are also becoming the scenes of geopolitical games.
“Our region has become one of those regions,” he added.
According to the Prime Minister, due to its more important role, today Central Europe is also a scene of geopolitical games. This should be seen as something natural, this is not a problem, but a good sign indicating that this region has become important, he concluded.
He stressed that energy policy is “a prominent territory and means” for geopolitical games in Central Europe, but perhaps equally on the entire continent.
He said when the two countries’ power supply systems are finally connected together and the project necessary for this is launched, the two countries will strengthen their positions in these geopolitical games. If Slovenia managed to come to an agreement with Hungary about the gas supply systems, that would also have geopolitical significance, he added.
He observed that if we managed to significantly increase the capacity of railway connections between the two countries, that would likewise have geopolitical significance.
Mr Orbán said this could enhance the two countries’ independence and sovereignty as well as the region’s strength, and if they manage to become better protected against geopolitical games, they will also be able to better enforce their own interests.
He stressed that what is happening here is a joint Slovenian and Hungarian interest, and at the same time a Central European interest.
“When a nation decides to connect itself to another country,” that takes some trust, in particular, if such crucial systems are connected together as those responsible for our power supply, he said.
He recalled that Hungary has a special history, it was surrounded by an air of distrust for a long time, and it has been required to invest a lot of energy in developing relations with its neighbours that are based on trust. These efforts have resulted in varying degrees of success, but there are countries with which Hungary has developed very good relations, he stated.
He took the view that relations with Slovenia are somewhat lacking in this regard, “the two nations did not take much notice of one another,” in the past 20 to 30 years, they have tried to live their lives without bothering one another.
But “this is a huge luxury” because if there are two nations that could have relations that are based on trust and if they can connect their resources together, then both nations could make more progress, he said.
According to the Prime Minister, however, it is not easy to build trust, and they must invest energy in this work for many long years in order to build that trust basis between the two nations which could enable them to create new projects out of strategic ones such as this, he stated.
He highlighted that this connection project is the largest Slovenian-Hungarian project that has taken place in the past decades, and is the flagship of Slovenian-Hungarian friendship and trust-building. The Hungarian government is fully behind this project, he pointed out.
He said it is to be hoped that this project will make the two countries realise that they are much closer to each other than they tend to believe.
Mr Orbán also pointed out that today in Europe gas is the cheapest in Hungary, and the price of electricity for retail consumers is the second cheapest in our country. It is important for our energy systems to be dynamic, flexible and connected together, he said.
He mentioned that he often consults with his Slovenian counterpart regarding the development of the virus situation, and they can learn a great deal from each other. The epidemic is still in an upward phase, but they are making every effort to contain it, he said, adding that as regards numbers, Slovenia is among the best in the fight against the epidemic in Europe, and for the time being, Hungary, too, is among those who are doing better than most.
The Prime Minister stressed that they will prevail once there is a vaccine, but that will not be tomorrow, and countries must be led until that moment.
They are better-equipped to perform this duty if the two countries also cooperate in the fight against the epidemic. Slovenia has been able to count on Hungary also to date, and “we, too, have always counted on Slovenia,” he said.