Socialists to probe parties’ stance on ‘super-Europe’

Socialist MEP István Ujhelyi said he would send a letter to Hungary’s parliamentary parties to probe their stance on joining a united “super-Europe” and the euro zone. 

A majority of the member states and leaders of the European institutions intend to create a closely integrated core within the bloc, Ujhelyi said. This “super-Europe” is to further boost security, progress and cooperation, he told a press conference on Friday.

According to their prevailing concept, this new formation will be based on the euro zone so that the “countries such as Hungary and Poland which actively obstruct all change within the EU” can be circumvented, Ujhelyi said.

The reform proposals will certainly be announced after the German general elections scheduled for September 24, he said.

In the letter, Ujhelyi will ask Hungary’s parliamentary parties about “which way they intend to lead Hungary”. If the governing parties do not abandon “unorthodox, illiberal politics, they will surely distance the country from this new kind of cooperation,” he said.

Of central eastern European countries, Romania and the Czech Republic have already announced their intentions to join the euro zone. Hungary, however, has not even asked for an observer status, Ujhelyi said.

Answering a question on Viktor Orbán’s Thursday letter to European Commission leader Jean-Claude Juncker requesting EU reimbursement for Hungary’s costs in the migration crisis, Ujhelyi said the letter was a “communications bluff”.

“Whatever the EC’s answer, Orbán is going to use it for domestic policy gains”, he said.

Source: MTI