Hungary opens new consulate in an EU capital

Hungary has opened a new consulate in Brussels, which is important also because the greater the uncertainty in the world, the more important it is for the state to provide security for Hungarians at home and abroad, Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó said in Brussels on Monday.

The ministry cited Szijjártó as saying that the significance of Hungary’s foreign representative office network had increased significantly in the recent, difficult period characterised by security challenges. He noted that during the coronavirus pandemic, more than ten thousand Hungarian citizens had been helped return to Hungary.

Personal presence is required to represent Hungary’s interests and recognising this, Hungary had opened a number of new embassies and consulates around the world in the past eight years, he said. Their total number currently reaches 135 and the trend will continue, he added. A total of 400 million forints (EUR 960,000) have been spent on the new consulate which will serve, among others, the around 20,000 Hungarians living in Brussels, he said.

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Agriculture minister calls for extraordinary EU aid to farmers

Hungarian farmers need extraordinary subsidies from the European Union due to the war in Ukraine and the EU’s sanctions, so that they can ensure safe food supplies, Agriculture Minister István Nagy said in a statement on Monday. Speaking after a meeting of his European counterparts in Brussels, Nagy said most of them had asked the European Council to activate a reserve fund of 450 million euros set up for agricultural emergencies.

The minister said soaring energy prices had increased the cost of food production, which could no longer be covered even by higher producer prices. He insisted that “agriculture had nothing to do with causes of the crisis” and “farmers cannot be expected to manage the situation by themselves, left without assistance”.

Nagy said he hoped the commission “would hear the request of most member states” and make a proposal to activate the reserve fund in the first months of 2023.

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Source: MTI