Visegrád Four

President Wolfgang Sobotka of the Austrian National Council held talks in Hungary

Sobotka Austria Hungarian Parliament

Viktor Orbán, Hungary’s prime minister, and President Wolfgang Sobotka of the Austrian National Council held talks on bilateral relations and the European integration of the Western Balkan countries in Budapest on Thursday, the prime minister’s press chief told MTI.

Orbán and Sobotka agreed that what is already excellent cooperation between the Visegrad Four countries and Austria should be further developed.

They also agreed that

Europe as a whole, and Austria and Hungary in particular have a vested interest in the European integration of the Western Balkans.

Senior representatives of the V4 group and Austria are scheduled to hold a meeting in Budapest on June 21.

Sobotka also met House Speaker László Kövér, who said that expansion at the Western Balkans is a “key issue” regarding the future of the EU, and Hungary will give all possible help to Austria, which takes over the rotating EU presidency on July 1. Expansion is vital to the region’s security, he said, adding that sceptical states should be convinced to prioritise it.

After meeting Kövér, Sobotka said “good neighbourly relations” were instrumental in advancing the region’s interests.

The integration of the Western Balkans is important to ensure the region’s stability and the rule of law, legal certainty and the development of democracy.

Economic ties between the countries are intense, he said, with both countries’ economic players “very happy” with the developments of the past two years, he said.

Sobotka also called for reviving the EU Strategy for the Danube Region, which has been in “an enchanted sleep” since, he said.

Photo: MTI

Hungarians admiring Putin

As Globsec Trends’ latest survey revealed, Vladimir Putin is the most popular leader in Hungary, according to Index. Though the V4 countries seem to follow a similar political course, this survey clearly highlights the minor differences between the attitudes of the people of Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary.

Globsec has revealed its fresh survey in a security policy conference in Bratislava. Though there are efforts in the V4 to become an alternative power in opposition to Western Europe, each country represents a rather different attitude towards its position between East and West.

Though all the four countries have been liberated from the socialist regime about three decades ago, they do not prefer the West obviously.

Poland is the only one that sides with Western Europe, the other three countries place themselves somewhere in between. The West gained some popularity in Hungary compared to last year — however, 47 percent of the respondents still prefer being in a third direction. Still, people younger than 24 clearly favor the West. In the V4, Slovakia seems to be the most anti-West.

Though the opinions about the EU vary on a large scale in Central Europe, respondents mostly admit that there is no other choice but being part of it. In Hungary, 58 percent of the sample thinks that the European Union is a positive thing, while only 9 percent dislikes it. About three quarters of the respondents prefer staying in the EU. NATO has a similar tendency in the V4 except Slovakia: Hungary’s northern neighbors tend to reject the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

The survey also analyzed the popularity of the four prime ministers of the V4: Andrej Babis (Czech), Robert Fico (Slovakian), Mateusz Morawiecki (Polish) and Viktor Orbán (Hungarian). The Hungarian leader is well-known among the partner countries, as 91 percent of the Slovakians, 70 percent of the Polish and 62 percent of the Czechs have already heard of him.

The Hungarian sample proved to be the less aware of the international leaders of the survey. French PM Macron, for example, is unknown for the half of the younger generation. Macron is both the least known and the most controversial leader for the population of the V4. The poll compared the popularity of the four leaders with the greatest current powers (Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin, Angela Merkel and Emmanuel Macron), and the results differ greatly among the Visegrad members. Macron is the most popular of them in the Czech Republic, while he is the least favored in Hungary.

Hungarians prefer Putin the most with about a third of the positive ratings.

This is might prove the popular opinions in the USA about the country. Putin is followed by Trump with 30 percent – he has already been revealed as not being too popular among Hungarians – Merkel with 27 percent and Macron with 25 percent. Putin’s evaluation is quite controversial: he is admired in Slovakia even more than in Hungary, while the Poles despise him the most. For the record, Angela Merkel is the most popular in Poland, despite the nation’s long-lasting anti-German attitude.

The survey also studied another peculiar aspect of everyday politics: the conspiration theories. The idea of a Jewish background power is accepted by 52 percent of the Slovakians, while this rate is 38 percent in Hungary.

However, the end of the communist regime is only viewed by 62 percent of the Hungarians positively and a similar percentage states that life was better before 1989 than after it.

Photo: Wikimedia Commons

Poland and Hungary want a strong Europe, says Hungarian FM

poland hunary foreign minister

Poland and Hungary want a strong Europe that is able to protect its borders and the security of its citizens, Péter Szijjártó, Hungary’s foreign minister, said on Thursday after talks in Warsaw with Jacek Czaputowicz, his Polish counterpart.

At a joint press conference, Szijjártó said both countries want a strong Europe. “But it is also clear that a strong Europe must be based on strong member states and strong regions.”

“This is why central Europe, based on a strong Poland and Hungary, is in Europe’s interest,” he added.

Czaputowicz said the Visegrad Group of countries shared a similar European vision: a competitive, non-protectionist, democratic European Union whose legitimacy stemmed from national parliaments. He said Poland and Hungary had similar positions concerning topical EU issues such as the community’s 2021-2027 budget. The two countries will work to maintain the EU’s cohesion funding mechanism and the common agricultural policy, he said.

Asked if Hungary would veto the EU budget if payments were tied to the rule of law in the target country, Szijjártó said:

“The attempt by some to attach subjective criteria regarding the rule of law on top of the objective criteria applied so far is a novelty.”

He said it was an “attempt to create potential for political blackmail” and called it “very un-European”. He added that changing the mechanism of EU payments must be tied to a “clear legal procedure”.

“Our friends in the West make it appear as if those funds were some kind of humanitarian aid,” Szijjártó said, noting that those funds were due to members states under the EU treaties. When Hungary and Poland joined the EU they opened up their markets to western companies which then “gained huge profits”, he said, adding that “out of each euro received 70 cents go back to western European companies”.

Survey: Central and Eastern European citizens favour strong regional cooperation

Two-thirds of citizens in central and eastern Europe want to see regional cooperation further strengthened, the head of the Nézőpont Institute said at a conference on the subject in Budapest on Wednesday.

At the conference on central European cooperation, Csaba Fodor said that of the 1,000 respondents each surveyed in 9 countries, 80 percent had heard of the Visegrád Group, and 65 percent saw the forum as important. Only 20 percent had heard of the Three Seas Initiative — a forum of CEE countries belonging to the EU around the Baltics, Adriatic and Black Sea — but 64 percent viewed that as important, too, he said.

The countries involved in the survey were Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Austria, Slovenia, Croatia, Romania and Bulgaria.

Fully 75 percent of respondents said they supported their countries’ EU membership, with the Polish and Romanian support the highest (84 percent). Czech and Slovak citizens were the most critical, where 24 and 28 percent, respectively, wanted a divorce from the bloc. In Hungary, 68 percent said they backed the country’s EU membership.

Asked about the EU leadership, 53 percent said they were dissatisfied with it.

Fully 74 percent of respondents rejected migration from outside the continent, and 65 percent were in favour of preserving Europe’s Christian culture, Fodor cited the survey as saying.

Speaking at the conference, Speaker of Parliament László Kövér (ruling Fidesz) said that political elites in western and central and eastern Europe had given different answers to the challenges of preserving a secure democracy on the continent. They agree that the rule of law and the welfare state are assets, Kover said. But on the need to preserve the “steadiest cornerstones of our identity”, such as sexual, family, religious and national identity, they cannot see eye to eye, he said. This is the biggest rift within the EU, he said. In the coming years, citizens of western European countries will have to stand ready to reject a policy devoid of the concept of identity within the framework of democracy, he said.

Cooperation of central and eastern European countries can strengthen all partners, thereby strengthening the “democratic order” of the region, he said.

Defining common goals can also save these countries from becoming pawns in other countries’ power games, Kövér said.

Featured image: Wiki Commons By Scooter20

Hungary’s FM: Europe’s borders to the south, southeast unprotected

Visegrad Gorup V4 Hungary

The situation is unchanged from 2015 in that the European Union is unprotected to the south and its borders are wide open, Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó said on Friday in Athens.

According to the Hungarian Foreign Minister, the arrival of a new wave of migration into Europe from a southern or south-eastern direction is exclusively dependent on continued compliance to the migration agreement between the EU and Turkey.

“This is one of the reasons why it is extremely important to keep Hungary’s southern border closed.

Because if another wave of illegal immigration sets out in a south-eastern direction via the Western Balkans, in view of the lack of any other obstacle, it will immediately appear at Hungary’s southern border”, Mr. Szijjártó said.

The Minister, who is attending a meeting of foreign ministers from the Visegrád Group (V4) and the Balkan countries in the Greek capital, stressed: “With relation to the future of Europe, it is unavoidable for the migration crisis to be the most important issue on the agenda”.

“In Greece, the situation is becoming more dramatic day-by-day. The number of illegal immigrants arriving in Thessaloniki increased by 500% in April alone”

Mr. Szijjártó explained, adding: “According to the locals the situation is beginning to resemble that of 2015, on top of which Greece’s Constitutional Court has stated that people arriving on the island can travel on to the mainland”. “And where will they travel on to from there?”, the Minister asked.

According to Mr. Szijjártó, migration pressure will most certainly increase, because the ongoing debates within international organisations are inspiring further migration instead of stopping it.

“During the course of these debates we are continuously hearing that migration is good and that migration must be encouraged”, the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade pointed out, according to whom the African position is overwriting the EU position, and the EU is complying with the African context, and all of this is having an encouraging effect on migration processes.

“In view of the fact that Europe’s southern and south-eastern borders are open and defenceless,

just as they were three years ago, Hungary’s southern border defence measures must be maintained at the strictest possible level”, Mr. Szijjártó underlined.

The European Union and Turkey agreed two years ago that Ankara will readmit everyone who enters the territory of the European Union illegally, and in return the EU will provide several billion euros to help Turkey provide for the millions of refugees currently in Turkey, in addition to admitting a Syrian refugee from Turkey in exchange for every Syrian illegal immigrant it sends back.

Photo: MTI

Heroes’ Square to host concerts, performances in June

budapest heroes square

Heroes’ Square in Budapest is hosting concerts of Emir Kusturica’s No Smoking Orchestra, the Visegrad Dance Carnival and the premiere of the rock opera Trianon on June weekends, organisers said on Friday.

On June 15, Serbian director and musician Emir Kusturica’s No Smoking Orchestra will perform with Hungarian groups Szalonna and Koló Zenekar, combining Hungarian and southern Slavic music.

June 17 will see the premiere of the Visegrad Dance Carnival, featuring several hundred dancers and musicians combining Hungarian, Slovak, Czech and Polish folk music and dance, with a special emphasis on Gypsy art within these countries.

On June 22 and 23, Gábor Koltay’s rock opera Trianon will premiere at Heroes’ Square, featuring 15 singers, 20 actors, 100 extras and 30 riders on horses as well as 40 acrobats in a production costing 400 million forints (EUR 1.3m), organisers said. Read more here: Trianon rock opera.

Hungarian foreign minister: Austrian president ‘siding’ with Soros, migrants

Alexander Van der Bellen Austria President

The president of Austria has “taken sides with George Soros and the migrants”, Péter Szijjártó, the Hungarian foreign minister, told MTI on Sunday.

Szijjártó responded to recent remarks by Alexander Van der Bellen, who had referred to US financier Soros in a recent interview as a philanthropist who has donated huge sums to education and civil organisations promoting democracy, and suggested that

Austria should support the policies of France rather than the Visegrad Group, which “does not offer anything exciting for Europe”.

In his interview to Profil weekly, Van der Bellen also suggested that Europe’s demographic issues could be resolved through accommodating migrants, but added that increased focus should be paid to their integration or else “the problem could backfire” in 10-20 years. Settlers need to be provided education and jobs, as well as services for children, the paper quoted the Austrian president as saying.

Szijjártó said in reaction that Van der Bellen was “wrong” because Soros “represents migrants and especially his own interests rather than Europeans”. Soros is a “speculator” who would “leave migrants, chaos, and destruction behind”.

“The Hungarian government wishes to build on Hungarian families living in peace and security rather than on migrants,” Szijjártó insisted.

Photo: MTI/EPA/Vu Hong

European Parliament committee takes Hungary to task over corruption

The European Parliament’s (EP) budgetary control committee (CONT) has cited “serious corruption” in Hungary in a draft report approved on Wednesday.

The draft opinion says “the current level of corruption, and the lack of transparency and accountability of public finances, affects Union funds in Hungary.” This could harm the European Union’s core values, justifying an Article 7 procedure that would ultimately strip Hungary of its EU voting rights, it said.

The Committee on Civil Liberties and Justice and Home Affairs (LIBE) has asked CONT to attach its opinion to a forthcoming report LIBE is preparing on Hungary.

The draft opinion states that since 2008 Hungary has fallen by 19 points in the Corruption Perception Index, “making it one of the worst performing” member states.

It noted that the European anti-fraud office (OLAF) conducted 41 investigations between 2013 and 2016, making Hungary the second most investigated EU member.

The committee’s report also criticised shortcomings in public procurement practices in Hungary. It “notes with concern” that the share of public procurement contracts with a single bidder, at 36 percent, was the second highest in the EU.

In the document approved by the committee with 13 members in favour and 2 against, the MEPs insisted that poor governance hindered economic development and reduced the impact of public investment.

The committee noted that economic growth in Hungary reached 16.1 percent between 2004 and 2016, slightly exceeding the EU average but significantly lower than the growth rate of the other Visegrád countries.

CONT called on the European Commission to incentivise member states to join the European Public Prosecutor’s Office (EPPO) and suspend EU funds for those countries unwilling to do so. It also said that a “vibrant civil society plays a vital role in promoting transparency and accountability”.

Hungarian Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó called the draft LIBE report “the basic document of a show trial”, adding that it contains “lies and factual errors that undermine the whole document’s credibility.” The minister said he definitively rejected the allegations levelled at Hungary in the draft.

Should corruption be as rampant in Hungary as the report suggests, Szijjártó said, the country’s economy would not have increased continuously since 2010, he said.

The committee’s decision to accept the draft by a large margin can only be interpreted as “a new political attack on Hungary by some Brussels institutions.

Fidesz MEP Tamás Deutsch said the document was a one-sided and biased “political pamphlet” that “ignores the facts and contains a lot of slippery and erroneous data”.

“The original submission is part and parcel of political charges and the document’s statements fall into the category of political bluff and biased, false statements,” Deutsch said, adding that the intent behind the Article 7 threat was to persuade the Hungarian government to change its position on migration.

“However, the government remains firmly in favour of the consistent representation of Hungarian interests … and will protect the country against illegal migration”.

Democratic Coalition MEP Péter Niedermüller warned that the payment of EU funds may be suspended in the future for states that are unwilling to join the European prosecutor’s office, and this would have grave consequences for Hungary. He insisted that the government was pursuing a “stupid and malicious policy” which lacked the support of its own European political family, the EPP. “Sadly, once again it is the country, the Hungarian people, that could lose out,” he said.

Featured image: Wiki Commons

HungaryTrends – The most important business and finance news

Budapest Eiffel house

See below main business and financial news from the previous week:

THE NEW DANUBE BRIDGE IS UNVEILED – HERE IS HOW IT WILL LOOK LIKE

The final results of the international architectural design competition launched in Hungary to select the best plan for a new bridge constructed over the Danube that fits into the image of Budapest and significantly reduces traffic congestion in the capital. In the following, you can get to know more information about their project and see how the new bridge will look like in the future. Read more HERE.

AIR CANADA ROUGE FLYING WHOLE YEAR BETWEEN BUDAPEST AND TORONTO

Air Canada’s flight between Budapest and Toronto used to be seasonal, but this will change soon: Air Canada Rouge’s planes will travel during the whole year from the winter season. Read more HERE.

VARGA TO KEEP ECONOMY PORTFOLIO IN NEW GOVERNMENT

Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said Mihály Varga would continue to oversee the economy portfolio in Hungary’s new government. Varga is “extraordinarily talented” and “extraordinarily experienced”, he said in a weekly radio interview.

OTP CANCELS CONTRACT TO BUY ROMANIAN BANK

OTP Bank Romania cancelled its contract to acquire Banca Romaneasca and other Romanian businesses from the National Bank of Greece. The contract was cancelled because conditions were not fulfilled on time, OTP Bank said. The acquisition failed to win the approval of the National Bank of Romania in March.

NBH DEPEPUTY GOVENOR SETS LOFTY TARGETS FOR LENDERS

National Bank of Hungary (NBH) deputy governor Marton Nagy said at portfolio.hu’s conference that Hungarian banks’ total assets need to reach an annual growth rate of 11 percent by 2030 for the country to achieve sustainable convergence. Corporate lending should grow by an annual 12 percent and retail lending by 15 percent.

HUNGARIAN BUSINESS HAVING ENORMOUS POTENTIAL IN CHONGQING

What business opportunities do Hungarians have in the Far East where a tough international competition awaits those who would like to start a promising and fruitful enterprise, namely in Chongqing, the business heaven of Central China? Doors are certainly open for Hungarian businesses in the Far East since Hungarians are warmly welcomed. Read more HERE.

V4 MINISTERS SIGN MOU ON INDUSTRIAL POLICY COOPERATION

Economy ministers of the Visegrad Group — Hungary, the Czech Republic, Poland and Slovakia — in Budapest signed a memorandum of understanding on cooperating in industrial policy.

MKB BANK PROFIT DOUBLES IN 2017

Consolidated after-tax profit of MKB Bank rose to 19.2 billion forints (EUR 61.7m) last year from 9.5 billion in 2016, CEO Adam Balog said. Pre-tax profit nearly tripled to 20.7 billion forints on improved results in the retail, corporate and private banking businesses.

MOL BOARD RE-ELECTS HERNÁDI AS CHAIRMAN

The board of directors of Hungarian oil and gas company MOL re-elected Zsolt Hernádi as chairman for another five-year term. Hernádi has been MOL’s chairman since 2000.

GERMAN-HUNGARIAN CHAMBER’S GAUGE OF CONFIDENCE RISES FURTHER

An annual gauge of business confidence by the German-Hungarian Chamber of Industry and Commerce (DUIHK) rose to 28 points from 21 points. More companies want to make investments and more than half plan to make new hires, the survey showed.

ATENOR GROUP HUNGARY LAYS CORNERSTONE OF 72,000SQM OFFICE COMPLEX

Property developer Atenor Group Hungary laid the cornerstone of a 72,000sqm office complex, dubbed Arena Business Campus, in Budapest. The first of the four office buildings is expected to be inaugurated in Q3 or Q4 of 2019.

MAKTEL TO PAY MAGYAR TELEKOM MKD 900M DIVIDEND

Magyar Telekom said it is entitled, indirectly, to a dividend of about 900 million denars (HUF 4.54bn/EUR 14.6m) from its Macedonian unit MakTel. MakTel shareholders approved a dividend of 1.58 billion denars at a general meeting during the week.

WABERER’S COULD PAY DIVIDEND ON 2019 EARNINGS AT THE EARLIEST

Hungarian haulier Waberer’s International could pay a dividend on 2019 earnings at the earliest, CEO Ferenc Lajkó told MTI after an annual general meeting.

Photo: MTI

Strong families basis for strong Europe, says Hungarian state secretary

Katalin Novak, state secretary for families and youth

Europe can only be strong if it is based on strong families, Katalin Novák, state secretary for families and youth, told a conference in Pozsony (Bratislava, Slovakia) on Saturday.

Addressing “The Europe we want – Conservative Summit”, Novák said the issue of demography and whether internal or external resources were the solution to its problems was a serious one not only for the Visegrad countries but for Europe as a whole.

Hungary’s standpoint is clear, she said: internal resources must be strengthened. In this respect, there is agreement among the Visegrad countries, she added.

“We must examine why we don’t have enough children and what it is that keeps young people from having children; what are the obstacles in their way, and how to help them overcome them,” she said.

“This is our answer to demographic challenges; not to import outsiders but to strengthen internal resources.”

Importing labour is a cosmetic solution to a problem that has not even been formulated at a European level, Novák insisted.

Photo: kormany.hu

Visegrád Four ministers sign Memorandum of Understanding on industrial policy cooperation

visegrád four

Economy ministers of the Visegrád Group signed a memorandum of understanding on cooperating in the area of industrial policy in Budapest on Thursday.

The MoU was signed by Economy Minister Mihály Varga, Czech Deputy Minister of Industry and Trade Vladimir Bartl, Poland’s Deputy Minister of Entrepreneurship and Technology Marcin Ociepa, and Slovak State Secretary of the Ministry of Economy Rastislav Chovanec.

“It is our goal for the region to become a flagship for the development of robotic and artificial intelligence in the coming decade,” Varga said at the signing ceremony.

He said the MoU was about raising V4 industrial policy cooperation to a new level, creating a common platform for managing manufacturing-commerce links, as well as harnessing advances in digital technologies, Industry 4.0 and the spread of robotics, which, he added, require continuous flexibility at European and global level.

Varga said one aim was to increasingly converge V4 industrial policies via the spheres of automotive and mechanical engineering.

Many types of cooperation in specialist areas particular to the region’s strengths remain untapped, and production segments in the automotive industry can be shared, he added.

In recent years, the average growth rate in the Visegrád countries has surpassed that of the EU, Varga said, noting EU growth of 2.4 percent last year as against the V4’s 4.3 percent. The region’s economies are catching up with the EU and gaining economic weight in the process, he added.

“It is the joint task of the Visegrád governments to support access to regional and global markets for promising SMEs operating in the region,” he added.

The European Competitiveness Council (COMPET) aims to boost industry’s contribution to economic output to 20 percent of the total, an initiative the V4 countries back and aim to build on, Varga said.

The minister said Hungary backs the initiative to connect the V4 capital cities, Warsaw, Prague, Bratislava and Budapest with high-speed rail.

The heads of the V4 countries’ statistical offices also signed a cooperation agreement at the meeting in Budapest on Thursday.

featured image: MTI

Hungary joins EU initiative on artificial intelligence

robot artificial intelligence

Hungary joined the European Union’s initiative on artificial intelligence at an event marking Digital Day 2018 in Brussels on Tuesday.

József Pálinkás, head of the National Research, Development and Innovation Office (NKFIH), signed the document under which member states will coordinate their efforts to do research in, make use of, and draft legal regulations pertaining to artificial intelligence, the office said.

The Visegrád Group member countries published a separate statement showing that they would jointly encourage developments in the field.

The NKFIH announced in January 2018 that it would allocate 1 billion forints (EUR 3.2m) to supporting research linked to artificial intelligence (AI).

AI research involves several disciplines of science, such as mathematics, robotics and machine learning, in which several Hungarian research teams are in the frontline in international comparison, Pálinkás said.

A sub-category in the National Excellence Programme and the EU initiative that Hungary has just signed will open new perspectives, including targeted EU support for research teams and industrial-research cooperation projects, he added.

Visegrad Group charity hotline to go live soon

visegrad group four v4

The Visegrad Group of countries will start a charity hotline after a few months’ preparations to help each other’s citizens in need in the event of a disaster, state secretary of the Ministry of Human Resources Miklós Soltész said on Friday.

Speaking at a press conference in Budapest, Soltész said the Hungarian proposal aimed at “real solidarity … was very positively received” by the governments of the other member states — the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia.

Real solidarity means providing help to people in need wherever they are, he added, whether they are victims of a disaster or Christians living in the Middle East.

Krisztina Dóra Varjú, ministerial commissioner in charge of Hungary’s 2017-2018 V4 presidency, said the charity hotline constituted a new dimension in Visegrad cooperation.

She said the Visegrad partnership was more than just a framework for the diplomatic and political events of which almost 300 have been held so far during Hungary’s V4 rotating presidency.

She said cooperation of the four countries has never been as important as “during these challenging times”, adding that it was a shared goal and a strategic interest to “build a central Europe that is successful, competitive and safe in the long term”.

Visegrád Four ministers discuss support for families

balog visegrád group poland czech family

Economic development should go hand in hand with providing support for families, Human Resources Minister Zoltán Balog told a panel discussion of his Visegrád Four counterparts held within a conference dubbed “Strong families for a strong Europe” in Budapest on Wednesday.

Balog said that “now that central Europe has become the engine driving European development it is crucial that families should benefit from that development”. The minister also said that while increasing the number of births is important, having children “in a responsible way” is also crucial. He added that “an increase in the appreciation and reputation of marriage has been the greatest achievement of recent years”.

Concerning the economy, Balog noted that low wages greatly contributed to Hungary being an attractive destination for investors. He insisted that “since low wages support competitiveness, wages cannot be increased quickly” but other conditions, such as accommodation, must be improved, and mentioned, for example, the government’s first home buyer programme.

Elzbieta Rafalska, Poland’s family and labour minister, said that

demographic problems cannot be resolved through immigration but a higher number of births, and added that her government ensures “unconditional” support to all families.

She mentioned Hungary’s family policy as a reference, and said that Poland has “learnt a lot” from the Hungarian government.

Jana Hanzlíková, Czech deputy minister for social policy, talked about an ageing Czech society, and said that her government was making efforts to ensure that “children grow up in well-functioning families” in which the parents can match work and private life.

Slovakia’s Boris Ondrus, state secretary for labour and welfare, said that running efficient family support mechanisms was a priority for his government, with special regard to providing incentives for young people to have children. The Slovak measures are aimed at ensuring that “having children does not result in a deficit in the family budget”, he said.

featured image: mti

Vast majority of Hungarians support border fence – Survey

orbán viktor prime minister hungary border fence serbia

Altogether 82 percent of Hungarians support Hungary’s border fence and just under 80 percent oppose the European Union’s migrant quota scheme, according to a fresh survey by the Nézőpont Institute.

The survey found that the border fence also has strong support among the voters of the opposition parties.

Fully 85 percent of the supporters of Jobbik approved of the fence, as did 74 percent of LMP’s, 65 percent of the Democratic Coalition’s and 49 percent of the Socialist Party’s voters.

On average, 63 percent of opposition voters agree with the government on the EU’s migrant quota scheme. Among Jobbik supporters, 76 percent reject it, compared with 65 percent of LMP’s, 50 percent of DK’s and 46 percent of the Socialists’ supporters.

Nézőpont also found that 68 percent of Hungarians believe that of Hungary’s political parties, ruling Fidesz is the most strongly opposed to immigration. Fully 53 percent of the survey’s respondents said that there were opposition parties that are pro-migration.

Nézőpont also surveyed the other three Visegrad Group countries — the Czech Republic, Poland and Slovakia — for their support for Hungary’s border fence.

It found that 60 percent of Poles and Slovaks and 55 percent of Czechs had friends and acquaintances who support the fence.

Nézőpont conducted the phone poll of 1,000 people in Hungary between March 9 and 14. It surveyed 1,000 people in each of the V4 countries between Jan. 18 and Feb. 13.

Photo: facebook.com/orbanviktor

Orbán congratulates Merkel, Seehofer on the new coalition

Germany coalition government

Viktor Orbán, Hungary’s prime minister, has congratulated Angela Merkel on her re-election as Germany’s federal chancellor and Horst Seehofer on his appointment to interior minister, the prime minister’s press chief told MTI on Wednesday.

In a letter addressed to Merkel, Orbán said Hungarian-German cooperation had contributed to shaping Europe’s future in a positive way several times.

“In view of Europe’s current situation, we can’t have another goal than to work for restoring the security of the continent, boosting our economies and promoting our citizens’ prosperity on the basis of close inter-governmental cooperation and German-Hungarian friendship,” he said.

Orbán expressed the conviction that both Germany and the Visegrád Four would promote the stability and development of Europe in the decade to come. Accordingly, a summit meeting during Hungary’s V4 presidency would offer a good opportunity for the discussion of a common future, he said.

In a letter addressed to Germany’s new interior minister, Orbán noted that during Seehofer’s term as Bavaria’s minister-president Hungary and that German land had further strengthened their cooperation looking back to a thousand years.

“It is my great pleasure that we will be able to cooperate with you as member of the Berlin federal government in resolving the challenges faced by out continent, on the basis of our common Christian and civic values,” Orbán said.

Featured image: MTI/EPA

Hungary warns of challenges from south at NATO meeting in Bucharest

refugees migration EU

Hungary shares solidarity with countries in NATO’s eastern flank concerning their worries about Russia but considers challenges from the south as equally important, a deputy state secretary in charge of security policy said at a NATO meeting in Bucharest on Tuesday.

Péter Siklósi cited instability in the Middle East and North Africa and the resulting interconnected threats of migration and terrorism as the main challenges.

He told MTI by phone that the regional meeting of defence ministers from the Baltic states, the Visegrád Group, Bulgaria and Romania is meant to pave the way for a NATO summit for heads of government and state to be held in Brussels in July.

“We are united against challenges and NATO is clearly suitable and ready to protect member states,” he said.

The participants of the B9 meeting in Bucharest were in agreement that a decision made at the NATO summits in Wales and Warsaw to adapt the defence alliance to new security challenges needs to be further implemented, Siklósi said.

The Bucharest meeting dealt with the challenges posed by Russia which especially affect countries that neighbour Russia directly or indirectly through the Black Sea. Hungary, the Czech Republic and Slovakia are less influenced by this, he added.

“I expressed Hungary’s solidarity with these member states but also called their attention to the equally important southern challenges that need to be addressed.

North Africa, the Middle East and the instability there, resulting in terrorism and mass migration as mutually reinforcing factors, these challenges need to be addressed in a similar manner,” he said.

The roots of today’s Visegrád cooperation

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According to GLOBS Magazine, the cooperation of the Visegrád countries, looking back on great traditions, is probably one of the most interesting partnerships in the world.

Even the name is special, since it was purposely named after the city lying on the coast of the Danube, north of Buda. This was the place where the Hungarian, Czech and Polish kings met in 1335. (In that time, Slovakia’s territory was under the control of the Kingdom of Hungary, meaning that the meeting covered all the four present member states). The Roman Catholic countries located between the Baltic Sea and the Adrian Sea agreed that they would communicate their economic and political needs together to the western powers (primarily to the neighbouring Holy Roman Empire) and eastern Orthodox or Muslim powers, which mostly signified the framing of a joint trade and customs policy in practice. So we already agreed back then that we would go together without separate deals with outsiders. Following the change of regime in 1989-1990, the leaders of the Central European region (József Antall, Václav Havel and Lech Walesa) had exact visions about how they wanted to lead out their countries from the institutional fetters of the Soviet rule, so they wound up the Warsaw Pact in the 1990s and quit the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance. Moreover, the states who once cooperated in Visegrád knew that besides introducing the market economy model in their countries, they also wanted to change their economic relations with the rest of the world based on the European principles and practices. They initiated so called Europe Agreements – more specifically, it is a type of free trade and economic cooperation relations – with the EU and signed agreements about the withdrawal of the Soviet troops. (When evaluating their result, it must be taken into consideration that the communist regime – then yearned to be reformed by the Soviet Union and Gorbachev – only collapsed in the second part of 1991.) That was when the three great statesmen decided to re-establish the historic Visegrád cooperation to achieve joint goals in the economic and geopolitical vacuum – since they could only join the EU and NATO later.

The memorandum of association was signed in February of 1991 – at that time the countries were still hosted the Soviet troops – and the institutional cooperation was launched immediately. Since the split of Czechoslovakia in 1993, the Visegrád Group has four members.

The power and attractiveness of the cooperation is demonstrated well by the fact that many of the neighbouring, west-oriented countries wanted to join them, but it was always turned down by the founders. At the same time, the so called Visegrád+ political cooperation is focused on a more and more extended cooperation – most intensely with the countries of West Balkan and the Eastern Partnership. Therefore, the Visegrád Group fought arm-in-arm for their integration goals, such as a strong cooperation with NATO – as part of the Partnership for Peace programme until the admission in 1999 (Slovakia was only admitted in 2004) – and the accession to the European Union following the successful partnership agreements to the start of the negotiations in 1998 and the accession in 2004.

The Central European Free Trade Agreement (CEFTA) was worked out and enacted right in the beginning of the cooperation in order to boost the failed trade between the member countries.

This didn’t only have a good influence on the traditionally state-owned or nationally owned companies’ product and service trade, but it also launched prosperous trade and production cooperation between the regional subsidiary companies of the foreign direct investments (FDI) and their other interests in the countries. This was accompanied by a quick visa-liberalisation in the EU for the citizens of our countries – free flow of labour wasn’t established at the time – which resulted in outstanding growth in trade turnover and touristic performance with both the EU and each other from the 2000s. A curiosity about CEFTA is that it was open to other countries of the region as well, and after the Visegrád countries joined the EU in 2004, it became a living heritage of the 1991 foundation through the states waiting to be admitted. Even though the Visegrád countries joined the Schengen zone in 2007, the integration pace is very different regarding the admission to the euro zone. They all accepted the introduction of the joint currency with the signature and ratification of of the Accession Agreement, but the date is not defined and neither Hungary, nor Poland and the Czech Republic seem to be ambitious to set a concrete date. Slovakia gave up its own currency, the Slovak corona in January of 2009. It’s hard to decide whether Slovakia – who wanted to strengthen by this its European determination – or the other three partners took the right step, but I think it says a lot that Slovakia’s economic growth has fallen back to the Hungarian level since her entry in the euro zone – just at the time if the financial crises in Europe. Economists discuss whether this is the result of the introduction of the euro in Slovákia or the lack of it in the other three Visegrád countries.

The success and development of the group is also demonstrated by the Visegrád Fund set up in 2000, which helps the establishment of human relations and the cooperation of the scientific and cultural spheres with a moderate budget. The fund also receives support from countries outside of the Visegrád Group, with which it aims to strengthen cooperation with Germany for instance, and other great, developed world economic and political partners like Israel, Japan and South Korea.

It must be highlighted that before the high-level union meetings, the Visegrád leaders always consult each other at ministerial level. Furthermore, the cooperation between parliamentary and professional organisations have become just as important as the cooperation of the governments.

The cooperation is still based on structural economic similarities, because the countries’ foreign direct capital/GDP rates are still among the highest in the European Union, while the chances of the four countries to be involved in the international productive value chains are also similar. Hence, the EU plays a significant role in their trade – especially export – whereas the export capacities of enterprises in national ownership is quite low everywhere. Our demographic trends, and the rate and direction of emigration with purposes to work abroad are similar as well, however, the latter issue is probably a bit more moderate in the Czech Republic. The countries have similar views – though expressed with different vehemence – on the dangers regarding migration, therefore we aim to keep the key to immigration policy in our hands. A good example of outstanding solidarity is the way our partners help protect Hungary’s southern borders against illegal immigrants, and how we joined our forces to send policemen to Serbia and FYROM to strengthen expertise and solidarity at the southern borders.

The urge to represent our joint interest in Brussels is not only confined to the consequences of the persistent approach regarding our immigration autonomy, but the challenges EU’s great policies are facing must be mentioned as well. So far, we always managed to live through the issues concerning financial budgets and the reforms of cohesion and agricultural politics with beneficial outcomes. We are encouraging the strengthening of EU’s defence capability, we set up the Visegrád Combat Team that can help our smaller regional partners, like Slovenia or the Baltic states in fulfilling their needs regarding protection.

Hungary took over the one-year presidency of the Visegrád Group for the fifth time on the 1st of July, 2017.

We hold the presidency in a period, when we have to protect our joint interests at several negotiations of key importance in the EU, not only concerning the budget guidelines, but also regarding the effects of the BREXIT talks. London is the important employer of the Visegrád work force, and it used to be one of the main net contributors of the joint budget, from where the Visegrád countries received significant sources for the development and cohesion of the regions and the support of agricultural producers, which shall be expected to continue to be provided.

Another joint challenge is that Brussels initiated infringement proceedings against three Visegrád member states due to the implementation of migrant quota schemes centred around the supervision of the requests of illegal immigrants entering the EU. The fourth country (Slovakia) also criticised the EU’s logic, when the country – along with Hungary – legally attacked the decision concerning the obligatory migrant quotas made on the session of the Home Affairs Council without consensus among member states, even if the two countries didn’t win the lawsuit formally in the European Commission. (To attest their solidarity, the Visegrád countries recently offered financial support to the mostly affected Italy.)

But the current situation in the case of Hungary and Poland is very unique: a so far unprecedented proceeding arose (it has already been officially initiated against Warsaw), which would withdraw the voting right of the member state – in other words the participation in joint decision making – due to the alleged violation of the different aspects of constitutionality and rule of law, not to mention that it could also come together with a punishment fee, which has also been unprecedentedin this field so far.

This is why it was very symbolic that the new Polish Prime Minister, Morawiecki, visited Hungary in the first days of January 2018 shortly after his entry into office to consult with his Hungarian counterpart, Viktor Orbán, who is not only a sympathetic ally, but also the head of government of the current presidency of the Visegrád Group. Hungarian and Polish people are not only connected by special historic events and similar values, but Poland has also grown to be one of our greatest trade partners in the post-communist world, while their touristic presence in Hungary has also reached a significant level.

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