Migration, EU budget in focus at V4-Austria speakers’ meeting

The issue of migration and the next European Union budget were in the focus of talks at a meeting of parliamentary speakers from the Visegrad Group and Austria on Friday.

Hungary’s László Kövér told MTI after the meeting in Balatonfüred, western Hungary, that the participants confirmed their position that the security of nations needs to be strengthened in connection with migration and it is necessary to set up hot spots outside EU borders where refugees and economic migrants can be identified.

The V4 countries of the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia consider the EU budget draft for 2021-2027 “substandard even for a starting point of further talks”,

Kövér said. It has a disadvantageous effect on central Europe and involves an over 20 percent cut in resources for the V4, he added.

The southern and western member countries that enjoy advantages in line with the new EU budget obviously face difficulties but they are also responsible for the situation that has developed, Kövér said. The budget draft represents a “punitive measure based on political bias by the European Commission” and

the V4 countries will protest against it and consider it unacceptable in the current form, he added.

The participants at the meeting said it is a welcome development that “similar views can be heard from Berlin concerning migration as those voiced by the Visegrad countries for the past several years now,” he said.

President of the Austrian National Council Wolfgang Sobotka presented at the meeting the policies that the upcoming presidency of the EU will follow, also mentioning the issue of democratic control over public media, Köver said.

Speaker of the National Council of the Slovak Republic Andrej Danko presented the plans of his country which will fulfil the next presidency.

Photo: MTI

Source: MTI