1 April 2015, Astana (Астана)
Good afternoon, Ladies and Gentlemen,
His Excellency the Prime Minister has honoured me with the opportunity to speak first. I would like to inform you that the cooperation between us transcends the usual collegial goodwill. When the Honourable Prime Minister visited Hungary, he made a powerful impact; his visit led to a genuine friendship between Hungary and Kazakhstan. We welcome this friendship, and it is a great pleasure for us to come to Kazakhstan. While within the European Union we are seen as political equals, in terms of our origins we are regarded as alien. When we go to Brussels, we have no relatives there; we know now, however, that in Kazakhstan we do have relatives. It is a strange feeling for one to have to go eastward in order to feel at home. The Hungarian delegation will always be delighted to come to you here in Kazakhstan – today our party of eleven includes six government members.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Across the globe today everyone is wondering how it is possible to make their own country successful in a rapidly changing world. It is not easy to answer this question – particularly if one is Hungarian. Our country is thirty times smaller than Kazakhstan. History has left us without most of the raw material and energy reserves we once had, and so it is difficult for Hungary to return to the path of success, since neither our size nor our natural assets have marked that route out for us. We can only make a living from that which we create with our own two hands and a sharp mind; this is something that we can turn to our advantage if we create good relations with the rapidly emerging parts of the world. Kazakhstan is one of the world’s fastest growing countries, and it has followed a fantastic course of development over the past twenty years. We believe it is rational for us to engage in close cooperation with Kazakhstan, and the Hungarian Government has therefore adopted a decision which I would like to announce here: we are going to join the Asian Development Bank. We shall follow Kazakhstan’s example. At today’s talks we identified the flagship of our cooperation as the Hungarian oil industry company that is operating here, in Kazakhstan. We have agreed to enter into an air transport agreement aimed at establishing direct flights between the two countries. We have agreed on cooperation in nuclear power provision, and we have also agreed on cooperation in the field of engineering services. We have accepted an invitation to the Economic Forum in May, and we shall also be represented here at Expo 2017. I would also like to stress the importance of cultural and educational cooperation. We already have an Astana Street in Budapest, dozens of Kazakh students study in Hungary and, as a result of today’s talks, we shall increase the number of scholarships granted to Kazakh students by the Hungarian State to two hundred.
I therefore believe that our visit to Kazakhstan has been a success. I would like to express my most sincere gratitude to the Honourable President, who received me this morning, and I would like to thank His Excellency the Prime Minister for extending to us his friendly and practical assistance. I wish our hosts further outstanding achievements in the future.