Hungary helps Ukrainian refugees

Hungarian Interchurch Aid has helped several thousand refugees at its Budapest centre for supporting Ukrainian refugees that opened eighteen months ago, the organisation’s head said on Friday, after meeting with Transcarpathia governor Viktor Mikita.

László Lehel told public media that Mikita had been following the aid group’s activities closely, and they met regularly, while the governor had also helped appreciably when it came to such things as contacting other governors.

Since the war started more than two years ago, Hungarian Interchurch Aid has helped over 500,000 people in Ukraine and Hungary, he noted. The organisation is present in every Ukrainian county, having opened offices in several locations carrying out “the main aid activity in Ukraine”.

Mikita said his office had been working together with the aid organisation since the start of the war, carrying out successful work, including the renovation of a kindergarten and school, building maternity homes and helping refugee mothers and their children.

Some 1,300 families have received help in Budapest so far

His visit to Budapest, Mikita said, also provided an opportunity to meet Ukrainian refugees living in the Hungarian capital and to discuss past and future cooperation with the charity.

Among planned projects, he mentioned setting up sports camps for children living near the frontline in Ukraine, as well as the provision of generators, solar panels and filling stations to residents in regions affected by electricity cuts as a result of the destroyed energy network in Kharkiv County.

Zoltán Sipos, the head of the aid group’s Budapest centre, said some 1,300 families have received help in Budapest so far, including humanitarian aid and support for their integration.

Finance minister: Funds disbursed to Ukraine must be monitored

Hungary considers it important to closely monitor the utilisation of the funding disbursed to Ukraine, Finance Minister Mihály Varga said in Luxembourg on Friday. Talking to Hungarian journalists after a meeting of the council of European Union finance ministers (ECOFIN), Varga said the European Commission must strive to ensure that the 50 billion euros allocated to support Ukraine’s reconstruction and reforms would be spent in a disciplined manner and used exclusively for the purposes they were provided for by the EU.

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