Hungarian FM visits Bavaria – Hungarian consulate general opens in the new building in Munich

Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó on Friday attended a ceremony to inaugurate the new building of Hungary’s consulate general in Munich.

In his address, Szijjártó said that Hungarians have worked and prayed a lot for their country to become successful again, but they could not have succeeded without their friends, Bavarians included.

Both Bavaria and Hungary are striving for a strong and competitive Europe, which “does not seek to get rid of Europe’s Christian roots” but seeks to return to those values, Szijjártó said.

BMW, government reach agreement on investment grant for EUR 1bn plant

An agreement was reached on Friday with executives of BMW on government support for a 1 billion euro plant the German carmaker will build in Debrecen, eastern Hungary, Szijjártó said after talks in Munich.

A contract on the support can be signed on October 12, Szijjártó said. The scale of the funding, as well as the details of the contract, will be made public, he added.

BMW announced late in July that it would build the plant in Debrecen. The plant will have the capacity to turn out 150,000 conventional and electric vehicles a year and will employ more than 1,000 people when production starts, read more HERE.

As we wrote yesterday, “Hungary has become a European automotive industry superpower”, Szijjártó said at an event to mark the 25th anniversary of the founding of Audi Hungaria Zrt, where temporary Chairman of the Board of Management of Audi AG Abraham Schot announced that the company will begin manufacturing of electrically driven vehicles at its plant in Győr, read more HERE.

Hungary to side with Bavarian car industry on pollution targets

Hungary will not back propose European Union rules on pollution that would harm Germany and Bavaria’s car industry, Szijjártó said on Friday.

Hungarian and Bavarian interests fully coincide when it comes to rejecting attempts by Brussels to tighten the European Union’s 2030 climate policy targets, Szijjártó told Hungarian public media, referring to assurances he had made to the heads of Audi and BMW.

Stricter emission targets would be “a slap in the face for the competitiveness of Germany and Bavaria’s car industry,” he said. This, in turn, would “seriously damage the Hungarian economy”, so Hungary will not support the initiatives, he added.

Photo: MTI