The Czech Republic

V4 Festival to be held end-June

Hungary festival V4

The VéNégy Festival featuring performers from the Visegrád Group is scheduled to be held between June 24 and 27 in Nagymaros, northern Hungary, organisers said on Wednesday.

The festival will see performances from Hungarian bands Halott Pénz, Punnany Massif and Bori Péterffy and the Love Band, among others. Austrian punk-metal band Russkaja will also perform, besides groups from the Czech Republic, Poland and Slovakia, they said.

The theatre tent will offer a workshop for V4 theatre professionals ahead of the festival, and will host a

colourful medley of performances from the four countries.

Other programmes will include street performances, sports opportunities and gastro programmes, the organisers said.

Should pandemic regulations not allow the festival to open in June, it will be pushed back to August 4-8, the organisers said in a statement to MTI.

The application for the immunity certificate will be ready soon

The application containing all information on the immunity certificate is practically ready to launch.

One of the most critical questions of these times is the immunity certificate: acquiring it and what it is good for. When it comes to travelling, Daily News Hungary has gathered all information you need to know regarding the issue.

As we reported on several occasions, the immunity certificate will be a crucial element of the following months, not only when it comes to travelling but everyday life and simple things as going out to eat in a restaurant.

According to information of Magyar Hírlap,

the application is ready to launch and will be downloadable in a matter of days

to tablets and mobile phones. Compared to the plastic card itself, it will contain more information.

The app will show both dates of receiving the vaccine after we registered.

It is a crucial aspect for many as total protection that comes with both jabs will be the condition of freely entering in many countries, which will be calculated after receiving the second dose. Data is said to refresh automatically in the application upon receiving the aforementioned second dose. Moreover, based on the news site’s further information,

the application will also show with which vaccine the patient was inoculated.

The immunity certificate may give you advantages inside Hungary, but it also grants you free entry and free return to and from certain countries, with which Hungary has signed a bilateral agreement to accept each other’s little plastic cards mutually. Currently, these six countries are the following:

  • Bahrein
  • Croatia
  • Montenegro
  • Serbia
  • Slovenia
  • Turkey

Hungary is working on expanding its list of cooperating countries at full speed. On Tuesday, the Hungarian Minister of Foreign Affairs Péter Szijjártó was conducting negotiations with the Czech Minister of Foreign Affairs Jakub Kulhánek. The two countries agreed on the importance of such a document in order to grant free movement between the countries. As both of them emphasised at their joint press conference, they agreed that the core question and details would be outlined later. Nevertheless, they will not waste a long time with it, as according to Kulhánek, details on free movement between the two countries can be ready by this weekend.

Furthermore, Péter Szijjártó is working on achieving the same easement with Slovakia.

It was announced by Ivan Korcog, Foreign Minister of Slovakia. The two politicians will conduct a meeting this Thursday.

As index.hu quotes the words of Korcog, first, Slovakia has to decide how its document proving the immunity of the patient will look like. Nevertheless, his country fully supports not only the bilateral agreement itself but the birth of such a document containing a regional solution even before a joint European agreement would be set up.

Speaking of an EU decision concerning a certificate or a document granting free movement, portfolio.hu writes that the original standpoint of the European Commission was that these national immunity certificates would lose their importance and power six weeks after the European immunity certificate is ready and the system is set up. It seems like these certificates, the general European one and the countries’ own national certificates, will function parallelly. Both Péter Szijjártó and Jakub Kulhánek emphasised this standpoint by saying that

a European immunity certificate will not overrule the nationally issued plastic cards, as the latter is a pre-step towards the launch of a European vaccine passport.

Read alsoAngry patients attack Hungarian doctors for the immunity certificate

Hungary provided 150 ventilators and 40,000 vaccines to Czechia by the end of May

czech hungarian foreign ministers

Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó on Tuesday held talks with his Czech counterpart, Jakub Kulhanek, on unimpeded travel of inoculated citizens into each other’s countries.

Szijjártó told a joint press conference after the meeting in Budapest that they had agreed on the matter in principle, and the details would be clarified shortly.

Kulhanek said the details of the agreement would be set down by the end of the week on lifting all travel restrictions between the two countries for inoculated citizens.

Szijjártó said the Czech Republic was one of Hungary’s closest allies, and bilateral cooperation had been exemplary during the coronavirus epidemic in terms of helping to repatriate their respective citizens stranded abroad, while

Hungary provided 150 ventilators and 40,000 vaccines to Czechia by the end of May.

Despite coronavirus-related impediments, trade turnover exceeded 9 billion euros and large companies of both countries actively invested in the other country, he noted. Oil and gas company MOL operates 304 petrol stations in Czechia, while energy company MVM Energetika already has 1.5 million Czech customers, he added.

Nuclear energy is an important part of the national energy mix in both countries, he said, adding that with a view to attaining climate targets, both jointly opposed negative discrimination against nuclear energy.

Szijjártó said both countries also agreed on issues concerning the European Union’s future, and both reject illegal migration and quotas, while prioritising the protection of the EU’s external borders.

Both countries also support Western Balkan countries in their quest to join the bloc, he added.

Asked about plans for a EU vaccine passport, Szijjártó said such a document should not override national regulations.

Asked about Hungary’s veto of the joint EU statement criticising China over human rights, the minister said the EU had issued a statement or taken decisions on China eight times so far without anything to show for it. A ninth statement would have been “pointless”, he said.

The Czech foreign minister expressed thanks to Hungary for its aid during the epidemic and for its statements in connection with the destruction of the Vrbetice armory, adding that Hungary had played an important role in drafting the related EU-NATO joint statement.

The Czech presidency of the EU was also on the agenda of the meeting, he said. “We need a Europe that confidently defends its values, freedom, democracy and human rights,” the Czech minister added.

The re-ignition of economies might turn into a struggle for guest labour

Guest Worker Labour Workforce Shortage Vendégmunkás labour market

According to some statistics, in the past five to six years, the number of guest workers working in Hungary have significantly grown, In some sectors, guest workers were the only viable option instead of shutting down. Unfortunately, due to the coronavirus pandemic that struck the world unprepared, many guest workers were stuck in their own countries unable to work. But as countries are reopening and the economy is starting to swing back up, a huge competition for workforce is expected.

There is the general belief among working people that guest workers take the job from Hungarians, but that is simply not true. It is quite the opposite. There have been entire sectors where the labour shortage was such a serious issue, that its operation was endangered, says Piacesprofit. There is nothing wrong with guest labour, but it should be adequately controlled and entirely transparent.

Csongor Juhász, the executive director of Prohuman, Hungary’s largest HR provider said that the current upsurge of labour is just the surface. He says that many people who have changed professions from services and the catering industry will, with the reopening of the country, go back to their original professions and in turn that will cause another labour shortage in some sectors.

There are already not enough workforce in sectors like the food industry, processing industry and in some commercial areas.

The above-mentioned re-distribution of the workforce will effect these sectors more severely and according to the professionals at Prohuman, that will cause a huge competition between Hungary and the surrounding countries looking for guest labour. In the Czech Republic, about 15% of the labour force are guest workers.

Csongor Juhász said to Piacesprofit, that Hungary is behind other countries in the labour competition.

It has to compete for non-EU guest labour with countries such as Austria, the Czech Republic, Germany, Poland, Croatia and Slovakia. The executive director added that Hungary is in a disadvantageous position due to several factors;

naturally, Western European countries have a better chance of obtaining guest labour due to the higher wages, but other Central and Eastern European countries also have an upper hand. Most guest workers can communicate in those countries in their mother tongues much more easily. The language is a huge barrier for guest workers coming to Hungary.

Another limiting factor is the travel. The authorities in charge have to balance between the proper monitoring of guest workers, in particular to the still ongoing coronavirus pandemic, but must also satisfy the labour need of affected sectors.

The monitoring should not bottleneck the flow of labour, but it must also ensure that there is as few cases of illegal workers as possible, all this while complying to the measures of the coronavirus pandemic.

If the flow of labour stops for a substantial amount of time, then companies might close their businesses and move to another country.

If this would happen to the car industry and processing industry – which are both major contributors to Hungarian economy –, then Hungary might face severe consequences.

NOVÁK Katalin
Read alsoMinister: Jobs, family, innovation are Hungary’s solutions to social challenges

Czechs says they lack info needed to assess Sputnik vaccine for use

sputnik vaccine

The Czech drugs regulator said on Thursday it lacked the documentation needed to fully assess Russia’s COVID-19 vaccine for possible use, drawing a rebuke from Moscow amid a separate, heated dispute over spying allegations.

The Czech Republic and Russia are embroiled in their worst row in decades after Prague said the same Russian agents accused of a 2018 attempt to poison a former Russian spy in Britain were also likely behind 2014 blasts at a Czech ammunitions depot.

The allegations, denied by Russia, have led to mass expulsions of staff from each of the country’s embassies.

New Czech Health Minister Petr Arenberger said on April 7 he would not oppose using Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine as part of a clinical trial.

But the head of the State Institute for Drug Control (SUKL), Irena Storova, told Czech Radio on Thursday that her office had not received enough documentation to make an assessment of its efficacy and safety.

“What we have seen is a fraction of the documentation that should be provided for the registration of a vaccine or medicine,” she said. It is up to the Health Ministry to decide on the use of the vaccine.

In Moscow, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov linked the apparent setback for its vaccine in the Czech Republic to the row over the arms depot explosions. “Such decisions, which are taken in the interest of a mood of provocation, are at the very least not in the interests of Czechs,” he said.

Even before the dispute over the arms depot explosions, the central European country had not yet opted to use the Sputnik vaccine as it lacks approval from European Union authorities.

Other countries have also said they lack sufficient documentation to use the vaccine, marketed abroad by the Russian Direct Investment Fund. Brazil’s health regulator this week ejected importing Sputnik, citing a lack of information.

In Czech neighbour Slovakia, where a rift over a Sputnik order forced the prime minister to resign, the regulator has yet to endorse the vaccine, also citing a lack of data.

Only Hungary has administered the Russian shot within the EU.

Hungary Slovakia Russia Sputnik
Read alsoDespite Hungary’s help, Slovakia won’t use Sputnik V for at least one more month

Czech lawmakers give nod to same-sex marriage, final vote uncertain

LGBTQ

A same-sex marriage bill in the Czech Republic cleared an early hurdle in the lower house of parliament on Thursday, but whether it will become law is uncertain with a general election less than six months away.

The legislation has languished for three years in parliament and has split parliamentary factions as lawmakers voted both in favour and against within their parties.

Around half of European Union countries have same-sex marriage laws.

In the Czech Republic, same-sex couples can enter into registered partnerships since 2006.

Critics say that step removed some obstacles, but does not place same-sex couples on an equal footing with heterosexual couples, especially in legal issues, such as child adoptions or property rights.

The new bill, which was approved in a first reading and will head to committee debate before a final vote, amends the Civil Code to say marriage is a union of “two persons”, instead of “a man and a woman” in the current version.

Opponents seeking to dismiss the bill lacked six votes among 93 lawmakers present.

At the same session, a counter bill also got through an initial vote. It aims for the country’s Constitution to say that marriage of a man and a woman is protected by law.

As the bills have to also pass the upper chamber, the Senate, and be signed by the president to become law, it is uncertain whether there is enough time for either to make it to a final vote before the Oct. 8-9 election.

https://dailynewshungary.com/we-are-at-war-poles-mark-womens-day-after-abortion-rules-tightened/
Read alsoPoland to ban same-sex couples from adopting, even as single parents

Hungary vetoed a firm V4 stance against Russia?

Hungary Russia diplomacy

The leaders of the Visegrád Group held talks as equals rather than exerted pressure on one another when they issued a statement of solidarity with the Czech Republic in its diplomatic conflict with Russia, Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó said on Wednesday in response to a question at a press conference on an unrelated matter.

The prime ministers of the Visegrád Group based on mutual respect and reciprocal benefits issued the statement at the initiative of Czech Premier Andrej Babis, he said. All signatories expressed solidarity “with their Czech friends” and the text reflected the positions of each prime minister, Szijjártó said.

Asked about press reports saying that

Hungary “vetoed a firm stance against Russia”,

Szijjártó said that Hungary had expressed its solidarity in a joint foreign ministerial statement as early as last week.

Hungary has also complied with the Czech Republic’s request to help guarding and operating the Czech Consulate-General in Ekaterinburg as long as Prague would be able to replace its diplomats expelled or recalled from Russia, Szijjártó said.

Hungary’s solidarity with the Czech Republic cannot be questioned, he said, adding that the government

was not planning to take further steps in this affair.

The Czech Republic recently expelled 18 Russian diplomats who were identified as working for the Russian secret service. In response, Russia expelled 20 Czech diplomats. On Monday the Visegrad Four prime ministers held a videoconference at the initiative of Poliah Premier Mateusz Mazowiecki. Polish government spokesman Piotr Müller said later that solidarity with and support for Prague’s steps had been one of the issues on the agenda.

Bulgaria probes possible Russian involvement in arms depot blasts

fire in szentendre

Bulgarian prosecutors said they are collecting evidence on the possible involvement of six Russians in four explosions between 2011 and 2020 at Bulgarian arms depots that were storing munitions for export to Ukraine and Georgia.

A spokeswoman said prosecutors could reasonably assume links between the

blasts in Bulgaria, the attempted poisoning of Bulgarian arms trader Emilian Gebrev in 2015, and munitions depot explosions in the Czech Republic in 2014.

The six Russians were in Bulgaria around the dates when the arms depot blasts occurred and attempts were made to poison Gebrev, prosecutors’ spokeswoman Siyka Mileva told a news briefing on Wednesday.

“The collected evidence points so far, with a great degree of credibility, to the conclusion that the aim of the actions of the Russian citizens was to stop the supplies of (munitions) to Georgia and Ukraine,” Mileva said.

“Evidence is being collected on the complicity of these six Russian citizens.”

Ukraine has been at odds with Russia since 2014 when its Crimea region was annexed by Moscow and Russian-backed separatists launched an insurgency in Ukraine’s east. Tensions between Russia and Georgia have been high since their 2008 war.

Mileva said prosecutors were liaising with counterparts in the Czech Republic to establish possible links between the Bulgaria blasts and the 2014 explosions at the Czech depot, which also stored munitions owned by Gebrev.

ALLEGATIONS

Moscow has rejected the Czech allegations as absurd

and on Wednesday Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov dismissed the Bulgarian investigation. “Either the Bulgarian side knew nothing and only now, after the Czech Republic announced the 2014 incident, decided to outshine the Czechs and look further back into history,” Lavrov told reporters. “Or they knew about for all this time but did not make it public for some reason.”

Mileva did not name the Russian citizens or provide other details about them but said three Russians who have been charged with the attempted murder of Gebrev were likely to have been intelligence agents.

Prosecutors said the explosion at an arms depot owned by Gebrev’s company EMCO in 2011, two blasts at state arms company VMZ in 2015, and a fourth at private arms producer Arsenal in 2020 all lacked obvious, technical causes.

The blasts were all triggered remotely and followed the outbreak of fires that the perpetrators apparently timed to allow workers to leave the area and avoid casualties, Mileva said.

“In all of the four blasts, production destined for export to Georgia and Ukraine was destroyed,”

she said.

In a statement, EMCO said the munitions destroyed at its depot in 2011 were not intended for export to Georgia and denied any link to the blasts at VMZ. EMCO urged prosecutors to seek the real reasons for the explosions.

Czech authorities ordered most Russian diplomatic staff in Prague to leave last week after accusing Russian spies of being behind ammunition depot blasts. Russia expelled Czech diplomats in retaliation. Bulgaria has voiced solidarity with Prague.

Featured image: illustration

Russia expels diplomats from Slovakia, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia

Russia Ukraine conflict

Russia’s foreign ministry on Wednesday ordered the expulsion of seven diplomats from Slovakia, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia, in retaliation for the expulsion of Russian envoys.

The ministry gave the three Slovak and two Lithuanian diplomats, as well as an envoy from Latvia and another from Estonia one week to leave Russia.

Russia accused the four countries of

showing “pseudo-solidarity” with the Czech Republic,

which ordered most Russian diplomatic staff in Prague to leave last week after accusing Russian spies of being behind a 2014 blast at an ammunition depot. Russia has dismissed the accusations as absurd.

Moscow and Prague are locked in their biggest row since the end of the Communist era in 1989.

The two suspects named by Prague

in connection with the 2014 ammunition depot explosion,

known under the aliases Ruslan Boshirov and Alexander Petrov, have been reported to be part of the elite Unit 29155 of Russia’s GRU military intelligence service.

Britain charged the pair in absentia with attempted murder after the poisoning of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter with the nerve agent Novichok in the English city of Salisbury in 2018. Russia denied involvement in that incident.

Czechs order Russia to pull out most embassy staff in worsening spy row

russian flag

The Czech Republic on Thursday ordered Russia to remove most of its remaining diplomatic staff from Prague in an escalation of the worst dispute between the two countries in decades.

The spy row flared on Saturday when Prague expelled 18 Russian staff, whom it identified as intelligence officers.

It said two Russian spies accused of a nerve agent poisoning in Britain in 2018 were also behind an explosion at a Czech ammunition depot in 2014 that killed two people.

Russia has denied the Czech accusations and on Sunday ordered out 20 Czech staff in retaliation.

Thursday’s decision, announced by Foreign Minister Jakub Kulhanek, requires Russia to have the same number of envoys as the Czech Republic has in Moscow. That means Russia will have to withdraw 63 diplomats and other staff from Prague, although Prague gave it until the end of May to do so.

Together with the initial step, this will greatly reduce what has been by far the biggest foreign mission to Prague and much larger than the Czech representation in Moscow.

“We will put a ceiling on the number of diplomats at the Russian embassy in Prague at the current level of our embassy in Moscow,” Kulhanek said.

“I do not want to needlessly escalate…but the Czech Republic is a self-confident country and will act as such. This is not aimed against Russians or the Russian nation, but a reaction to activities of Russian secret services on our territory.”

Russia’s Foreign Ministry in reaction demanded a reduction in the embassy’s staffing level, alluding to disparity in numbers of local employees.

“The (Czech) ambassador was told that we reserve the right to take other steps in the event the hysterical anti-Russian campaign spirals further,” Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said in a statement.

At a time of acute tension in Russia’s relations with the West, the dispute has prompted NATO and the European Union to throw their support behind the Czech Republic, which is a member of both blocs.

“Allies express deep concern over the destabilising actions Russia continues to carry out across the Euro-Atlantic area, including on alliance territory, and stand in full solidarity with the Czech Republic,” NATO’s 30 allies said in a statement.

Slovakia expelled three Russian envoys on Thursday in solidarity with the Czech Republic. The Russian response to that step was not immediately clear.

In the last week, Moscow has also kicked out diplomats from Bulgaria, Poland and the United States in retaliation for expulsions of its own staff.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Moscow took a negative view of Prague’s “hysteria”.

President Vladimir Putin warned foreign powers in his state of the nation speech on Wednesday not to cross Russia’s “red lines”, saying Moscow would make them regret it.

CZECHS SAY THEIR EMBASSY PARALYSED

The Czechs say the loss of the 20 staff has effectively paralysed the functioning of their Moscow embassy.

The Russian embassy’s size in Prague is an overhang from the pre-1989 communist era, and had been about double the U.S. Embassy until this week.

Kulhanek said on Czech Television that Russia told the Czech envoy on Thursday there now would be “strict parity”.

He said that meant each country would have 7 diplomats and 25 others at respective embassies, which is the current level of Czech staff in Moscow.

He said the Czech side was considering how to proceed further after the Russian demand to cut the number of local employees.

The ministry said on Wednesday Russia had 27 diplomats and 67 other staff in Prague after the previous expulsions.

The Czech counterintelligence service has repeatedly said that the mission served as a base for intelligence work and its size made it difficult to reduce these activities.

The two suspects named by Prague in connection with the 2014 ammunition depot explosion, known under the aliases Ruslan Boshirov and Alexander Petrov, are reportedly part of the elite Unit 29155 of Russia’s GRU military intelligence service.

Britain charged them in absentia with attempted murder after the poisoning of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter with the nerve agent Novichok in the English city of Salisbury in 2018.

The Skripals survived, but a member of the public died. The Kremlin denied involvement in the incident.

fire in szentendre
Read alsoRussian secret services behind Czech arms depot explosion?

Czechs threaten to expel more Russian diplomats

Czech Russia diplomat

The Czech Republic demanded on Wednesday that Russia allow the return of 20 expelled Czech embassy staff to Moscow by Thursday or face further evictions of its diplomats from Prague.

Speaking to reporters, Foreign Minister Jakub Kulhanek said Prague would equalise staffing at the countries’ respective embassies unless Russia allowed the Czechs back. Prague on Saturday expelled 18 Russian staff, whom it identified as intelligence officers, after saying two Russian spies accused of a nerve agent poisoning in Britain in 2018 were behind an earlier explosion at a Czech ammunition depot that killed two people.

Russia denied the Czech accusations and the Kremlin called the Czech actions “provocative and unfriendly”.

Russia retaliated by ordering 20 staff out from the Czech embassy in Moscow, which is smaller than the Russian embassy in Prague. “The counter-reaction of the Russian side…was disproportionate and de facto paralysed the functioning of our embassy,” Kulhanek told reporters.

“If our diplomats cannot return to Moscow, tomorrow afternoon I will decide on lowering the number of staff at Russian Federation’s embassy in Prague so it corresponds to the current situation at the Czech embassy in Moscow.”

The Czech foreign ministry gave the number of Czech diplomats in Moscow at 5, plus 19 other staff, after the first round of expulsions. Russia’s embassy in Prague now has 27 diplomats and 67 other staff,

it said. Both countries have additional smaller numbers of staff at consulates in other cities.

Russian secret services behind Czech arms depot explosion?

fire in szentendre

The Czech Republic will ask European Union and NATO allies to take action in solidarity with Prague in its row with Moscow, including expelling Russian intelligence officers from their countries, acting Foreign Minister Jan Hamacek said on Tuesday.

The Central European country on Saturday evicted 18 Russian Embassy staff, whom it identified as intelligence officers, over suspicions that

Russian secret services were behind explosions at a privately operated arms depot in 2014.

Moscow has denied any of its agents were involved in the blast, which killed two people, branding the Czech stance a provocation, and expelled 20 Czech diplomats and other staff in retaliation.

The dispute is the biggest between Prague and Moscow since the end of Soviet domination of Eastern Europe in 1989,

and comes amid growing tensions between Russia and the West.

“We will call for collective action by European Union and NATO countries that will be aimed at a solidarity expulsion of identified members of Russian intelligence services from EU and NATO member states,” Hamacek told a televised news conference.

Hamacek said he had summoned Russia’s ambassador in Prague for Wednesday, where he would inform him of a further Czech reaction. He declined to say what the reaction would be. The Foreign Ministry said Prague also asked for a special meeting of NATO’s North Atlantic Council this week.

“(The meeting) will allow for talks of possible further allied steps,” the ministry said on Twitter, adding the country would be sending a high-level representative.

Czech officials have pointed out Russia had more diplomats in Prague than the Czech Republic had in Moscow, which had made the Russian expulsions more damaging to embassy operations.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Tuesday that the Czech Republic’s allegations of Russian involvement in the 2014 explosion were unfounded and formed part of a wider series of attempts to contain Russia.

Prague previously said it had evidence backing the suspicion that the warehouse blast was caused by the same agents of Russia’s GRU military intelligence blamed for the poisoning of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal in Britain in 2018.

Moscow also denies involvement in the Skripal case.

Featured image: illustration

V4 foreign ministers express solidarity with Czech Republic in rift with Russia

V4

The foreign ministers of the Visegrad Group expressed their solidarity with the Czech Republic, which has recently expelled 18 Russian diplomats over suspicions of espionage, in a statement released late on Monday.

Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis said earlier the Russian diplomats were suspected of having had a hand in explosions in an ammunition warehouse in Vrbetice, in southeast Czechia, in 2014.

In retaliation, Russia expelled 20 Czech diplomats.

The foreign ministers of Hungary, Poland and Slovakia said in the statement published on the Polish foreign ministry’s website that they “condemn all activities aimed at threatening security of sovereign states and its citizens”.

“We stand ready to further strengthen our resilience against subversive actions at both national level and together with our NATO allies and within EU. The Foreign Ministers of Poland, Slovakia and Hungary express solidarity with recent steps taken by our close partner, ally and neighbor, Czechia,”

the statement said.

eu foreigner ministers
Read alsoHungary expects Ukraine to respect Hungarian community’s rights

Hungary expects Ukraine to respect Hungarian community’s rights

eu foreigner ministers

Hungary has a vested interest in a strong, stable and democratic Ukraine, takes a stand for its territorial integrity and independence, and expects it to respect the rights of nationalities, including the Hungarian community, Péter Szijjártó, Hungary’s foreign minister, said after an informal videoconference of EU ministers on Monday.

Over the past few years Ukraine has regularly violated the Hungarian community’s rights in culture, education, public administration and the media, he said on Facebook.

Hungary “was shocked to learn” that leaders of that community had been exposed to intimidating procedures last week. Nor does it serve mutual trust that the Ukrainian authorities have launched an action to identify dual citizens, he said.

Szijjártó asked Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba, who also logged into the conference, to respect minority rights and abstain from presenting the Hungarian community as one endangering Ukraine’s territorial integrity.

Hungarians in Transcarpathia (Kárpátalja) can always rely on support from Hungary and its government, he said.

“We will take a stand in all international forums for Transcarpathia’s Hungarian community and its rights,” he said.

Hungary has expressed solidarity with Poland over the arrest of the Polish community’s leader in Belarus and with the Czech Republic over its diplomatic conflict with Russia.

Szijjártó said the EU’s new partnership agreement with the African, Caribbean and Pacific countries, replacing the Cotonou Agreement last week, would encourage migration. Hungary therefore opposed the related clauses, citing the health and economic risks posed by migration, he said.

Concerning Ethiopia, the minister noted that Hungary had granted aid worth 2.5 million US dollars to that country’s Christian community. He expressed hope that Ethiopia would preserve its peace and stability, and would not become a source of migration.

Concerning Lebanon, Szijjártó said that

Hungary rejected all attempts by some European countries to exert pressure on the party that represents the Christian community of that country.

Hungary insists that Europe, the European Union should take a stand for Christians, irrespective of where they live, Szijjártó said.

Hungarian-Ukrainian couple trades Covid vaccines in Abu Dhabi

vaccine-covid-coronavirus

From a small office in an Abu Dhabi skyscraper, Ukrainian national Natalya Muzaleva and her Hungarian husband István Perger run an art gallery, a real estate agency and an oilfield services company.

They have also pursued another venture: selling COVID-19 vaccines into Europe.

Muzaleva wrote a proposal to the Czech ambassador to the United Arab Emirates, reviewed by Reuters and dated Feb. 24, offering to procure and sell at least 1 million doses to the Czech Republic of Covishield, the shot from Anglo-Swedish drugmaker AstraZeneca.

She said the vaccines would be supplied by an unnamed partner from AstraZeneca’s “UK and India plant” and delivery would follow within 45 days of payment being received.

While the Czech government did not take up the offer, it came to light on March 3 when Prime Minister Andrej Babis, singling Muzaleva out by name, told a news conference he would not support the “black market”.

Reached at her mobile number, Muzaleva said there had been “no deal” but declined to discuss the matter further. She did not respond to subsequent written questions.

After the Czech government made the unsolicited offer public, AstraZeneca said that there should be no private sector supply deals for the sale or distribution of the vaccine in Europe.

The drugmaker did not respond to requests for further comment for this story on Muzaleva’s proposal.

The Abu Dhabi media office also did not respond when asked whether authorities were aware of Muzaleva’s offer or whether they had investigated it.

Muzaleva’s email, details of which have not previously been reported, provides another window into how private individuals have tried to make money by offering shots to countries amid a global shortfall of vaccinations and as COVID-19 cases surge.

In neighbouring Germany, the government said it had received several offers of COVID-19 vaccines from intermediaries. Its response has been to tip off the manufacturer, the European Commission and, in some cases, international law enforcement.

“This pandemic is creating a gold rush atmosphere in which people try to do all kinds of deals,” Health Minister Jens Spahn told a news conference in Berlin on April 9 on efforts to fight the pandemic.

“Our government buys exclusively from manufacturers,” he said, responding to a question on whether the government had received unofficial vaccine proposals and how it handled them.

The European Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF), an EU agency, said that a dozen European countries had reported offers by intermediaries to sell large quantities of vaccines, with the apparent aim of securing down payments before disappearing with the money.

Such intermediaries had been inactive or trading in very different types of goods until recently, OLAF said in response to Reuters questions. It declined to discuss specific cases.

They are often located in third countries outside the EU “to make their identification more difficult and hard to investigate”, OLAF added.

In total, OLAF has observed scams or fake offers for around 1 billion vaccine doses, at a total asking price of almost 14 billion euros ($17 billion). It knew of no cases where a government had paid up for such a scam.

FIRST COME, FIRST SERVED

Muzaleva’s email was written in stilted English with poor punctuation.

“We will be privileged to source you the entire quantum of doses you require,” Muzaleva wrote to Czech Ambassador Jiri Slavik.

“I hope to hear from you at your earliest convenience, it must be stressed that vaccines are allocated on a first come first serve basis and the demand is understandably large.”

The Czech embassy referred Reuters to the Foreign Ministry in Prague.

“The embassy considered the offer to be credible also because it (the embassy) had received positive references (about the offer) from the leadership of the Hungarian embassy,” a foreign ministry spokeswoman said.

Reuters could not independently confirm this. The Hungarian embassy in Abu Dhabi and the Hungarian government did not respond to requests for comment.

Muzaleva made the offer in her capacity as chief financial officer of a company that is registered in Abu Dhabi called Enhanced Recovery Company Middle East LLC (ERC).

ERC’s business licence covers oil and gas services, general trading, trade in tea, para-pharmaceuticals and dietary supplements, according to an entry in the corporate registry that does not list its owners.

Para-pharmaceuticals are alternative medicines.

She sought 100% payment from the Czech authorities in advance secured against a guarantee from Commercial Bank of Dubai or First Abu Dhabi Bank, or a downpayment of 25% and the rest on delivery to ERC. Neither bank responded to requests for comment.

The Abu Dhabi PO Box address given by Muzaleva for ERC matches that of an art gallery she runs which shows mainly Ukrainian art, and a real estate agency. The agency is run by her husband, Perger, according to two current and one former staff members contacted by Reuters.

Perger is copied into the email sent by Muzaleva and is named as the recipient in a draft Letter of Intent that she sent asking the Czech authorities to sign to secure the Covishield shots. He did not respond to written questions or a request to comment passed through company staff.

The Czech Republic has had a tough pandemic – its cumulative death toll from COVID-19 is the highest of any country in the world, measured as a share of the population, according to Our World In Data.

Thus far, the Czech Republic has administered 2.47 million doses of various vaccines as of Sunday.

The Health Ministry’s figures showed it has administered first doses to 15% of the population, while 8% of the population has been fully vaccinated.

Speaking about why the Czech government refused the offer, Babis told the March 3 news conference that the government had pledged to only buy AstraZeneca’s vaccine directly.

“We will not support some black market and I cannot imagine the state would pay up front to some company where this person called Natalya is signing,” Babis said, referring to the vaccine offer from Abu Dhabi.

The offer was exorbitant, he added.

“If the offer was for $22 for AstraZeneca and we can buy it for about $2.50, then I really cannot take it seriously.”

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Retaliation: 20 Czech diplomats expelled by Moscow

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Moscow expelled 20 Czech diplomats on Sunday in a confrontation over Czech allegations that two Russian spies accused of a nerve agent poisoning in Britain in 2018 were behind an earlier explosion at a Czech ammunition depot that killed two people.

Prague had on Saturday ordered out 18 Russian diplomats, prompting Russia to vow on Sunday to “force the authors of this provocation to fully understand their responsibility for destroying the foundation of normal ties between our countries”.

Moscow gave the Czech diplomats just a day to leave, while Prague had given the Russians 72 hours.

The Czech Republic said it had informed NATO and European Union allies that it suspected Russia of causing the 2014 blast, and European Union foreign ministers were set to discuss the matter at their meeting on Monday.

The U.S. State Department commended Prague’s firm response to “Russia’s subversive actions on Czech soil”.

The row is the biggest between Prague and Moscow since the end of decades of Soviet domination of eastern Europe in 1989.

It also adds to growing tensions between Russia and the West in general, raised in part by Russia’s military build-up on its Western borders and in Crimea, which Moscow annexed from Ukraine in 2014, after a surge in fighting between government and pro-Russian forces in Ukraine’s east.

Russia said Prague’s accusations were absurd as it had previously blamed the blast at Vrbetice, 300 km (210 miles) east of the capital, on the depot’s owners.

It called the expulsions “the continuation of a series of anti-Russian actions undertaken by the Czech Republic in recent years”, accusing Prague of “striving to please the United States against the backdrop of recent U.S. sanctions against Russia”.

ARMS SHIPMENT

Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis said the attack had been aimed at a shipment to a Bulgarian arms trader.

“This was an attack on ammunition that had already been paid for and was being stored for a Bulgarian arms trader,” he said on Czech Television.

He said the arms trader, whom he did not name, had later been the target of an attempted murder.

Bulgarian prosecutors charged three Russian men in 2020 with an attempt to kill arms trader Emilian Gebrev, who was identified by Czech media as the same individual. Reuters was unable to reach Gebrev for comment.

Czech police said two men using the names Alexander Petrov and Ruslan Boshirov had travelled to the Czech Republic days before the arms depot blast.

Those names were the aliases used by the two Russian GRU military intelligence officers wanted by Britain for the poisoning of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter with the Soviet-era nerve agent Novichok in the English city of Salisbury in 2018. The Skripals survived, but a member of the public died.

The Kremlin denied involvement in that incident, and the attackers remain at large.

Czech interior and acting foreign minister Jan Hamacek said police knew about the two people from the beginning, “but only found out when the Salisbury attack happened that they are members of the GRU, that Unit 29155”.

Hamacek said Prague would ask Moscow for assistance in questioning them, but did not expect it to cooperate.

“DANGEROUS AND MALIGN”

British Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab tweeted that the Czechs “have exposed the lengths that the GRU will go to in their attempts to conduct dangerous and malign operations”.

A NATO official said the alliance would support the Czech Republic as it investigated Russia’s “malign activities”, which were part of a pattern of “dangerous behaviour”.

“Those responsible must be brought to justice,” added the official, who declined to be named.

The United States imposed sanctions against Russia on Thursday for interfering in last year’s U.S. election, cyber hacking, bullying Ukraine and other actions, prompting Moscow to retaliate.

On Sunday, U.S. national security adviser Jake Sullivan said

Washington had told Moscow “there will be consequences” if Alexei Navalny, the opposition figurehead who almost died last year after being given a toxin that Western experts say was Novichok, dies in prison, where he is on hunger strike.

The 2014 incident has resurfaced at an awkward time for Prague and Moscow.

The Czech Republic is planning to put the construction of a new nuclear power plant at its Dukovany complex out to tender.

Security services have demanded that Russia’s Rosatom be excluded as a security risk, while President Milos Zeman and other senior officials have been putting Russia’s case.

In a text message, Industry Minister Karel Havlicek, who was previously in favour of including Russia, told Reuters: “The probability that Rosatom will participate in the expansion of Dukovany is very low.”

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Czechia accuses Russian spies for ammunition depot explosion; expulses diplomats

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Russia said on Sunday Czech accusations that Russian spy services were behind an explosion in an ammunition depot were unfounded and absurd and it would retaliate for Prague’s expulsion of 18 Russian embassy staff.

The Czech Republic said it had informed NATO and European Union allies about suspected Russian involvement in the blast, which killed two people, and the matter would be addressed at an EU foreign ministers’ meeting on Monday.

The expulsions and allegations by the Czechs have triggered its biggest dispute with Russia since the 1989 end of Communist rule, when Prague was under Moscow’s domination for decades.

The incident also poured more fuel on the worst Russian-Western tensions since the Cold War, stirred in part by Russia’s military build-up on its Western borders and in Crimea, which Moscow annexed from Ukraine in 2014, after a surge in fighting between government and rebel forces in Ukraine’s east.

The Czech Republic kicked out the Russian embassy staff on Saturday after saying investigations had linked Russian intelligence to the blast in the ammunition depot some 300 km (210 miles) east of the capital Prague.

Russia’s Foreign Ministry said the Czech accusations were absurd as Prague had previously blamed the blast on the depot owners, and Moscow would hit back hard.

“We will take retaliatory measures that will force the authors of this provocation to fully understand their responsibility for destroying the foundation of normal ties between our countries,” a ministry statement said.

“This hostile move was the continuation of a series of anti-Russian actions undertaken by the Czech Republic in recent years. It’s hard not to see the American trace (here),” it said, accusing Prague of “striving to please the United States against the backdrop of recent U.S. sanctions against Russia”.

Czech Interior and acting Foreign Minister Jan Hamacek said on public television investigators believed the 2014 blast was meant to target an arms shipment due to leave the depot, and to occur after it was gone, likely to Bulgaria.

He said police had later identified two suspects as the same Russian military intelligence officers – Alexander Petrov and Ruslan Boshirov – wanted by Britain for the poisoning of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter with the nerve agent Novichok in the English city of Salisbury in 2018.

Petrov and Boshirov are believed to be aliases used by the Skripals’ attackers, who remain at large. The Kremlin denied involvement in the incident.

Hamacek said Prague would ask Moscow for assistance in questioning them but did not expect it to cooperate.

The Czech investigative weekly Respekt reported on Saturday that the arms shipment was for a Bulgarian arms trader who was believed to be supplying Ukraine at a time when Russian-backed separatists were fighting Ukrainian government forces in the country’s east.

Respekt and Czech public radio named a Bulgarian arms dealer who they said Russian agents had tried and failed to kill. News website Seznamzpravy.cz said the arms shipment may also have been destined for Syrian rebels.

Czech police said they were searching for two men who carried passports in the names of Petrov and Boshirov and were in the Czech Republic in the days before the arms depot blast.

TENSIONS RECALLING COLD WAR

On Sunday, the EU’s executive commission confirmed that the Czech row with Russia would be addressed during a previously scheduled EU foreign ministers’ video conference on Monday.

The United States and Britain offered full support to the Czech Republic, a NATO ally, in its dispute with Russia.

British Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said on Twitter the Czechs “have exposed the lengths that the GRU will go to in their attempts to conduct dangerous and malign operations,” referring to Russia’s military intelligence agency.

The United States imposed sanctions against Russia on Thursday for interfering in last year’s U.S. election, cyber hacking, bullying Ukraine and other alleged malign actions, prompting Moscow to retaliate.

The 2014 incident re-surfaced unexpectedly at a time of deep sensitivity for Czech-Russian relations.

The Prague government is planning to open a tender worth billions of euros to build a new nuclear power station, and security services have demanded that Russia’s Rosatom be excluded from bids as a security risk.

President Milos Zeman and other senior officials have been arguing for keeping Russia in the bidding, but the chances of that appeared on Sunday to have diminished significantly.

“The probability is very low that Rosatom will participate in the expansion of (nuclear plant) Dukovany,” Industry Minister Karel Havlicek, who was previously in favour of including Russia, told Reuters in a text message.

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Finance minister: Visegrád countries poised to be Europe’s engines of growth again

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The Visegrád Group countries aim to reclaim their place as Europe’s engines of growth once the coronavirus pandemic is over, Finance Minister Mihály Varga said after a video call with his V4 counterparts on Thursday.

The V4 countries are all on the same page when it comes to the question of how to reboot the economy, return to fiscal discipline and protect jobs, the finance ministry quoted Varga as saying in the call.

Concerning the European Union’s 750 billion euro Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF), Varga said he and his V4 counterparts agreed that their countries all faced the same challenges when it came to planning their recoveries and their talks with the European Commission.

All four countries are concentrating their recovery efforts on areas such as education, health care, the transition to a green economy, digitalisation, transport and job creation, he said.

Varga said he and his counterparts had also discussed the state of their countries’ budgets and the EU’s so-called Own Resources Decision which all member states must ratify in order for the EC to be able to start borrowing. Hungary’s stance on the law, Varga said, is that it must not place additional burdens on national budgets and must respect member states’ sovereignty on taxation.

The ministers also discussed the EU draft legislation that will define environmentally sustainable economic activities. The ministry noted that the V4 countries have issued a joint letter to the EC expressing their concerns that the draft does not cover nuclear energy and does not recognise the role of natural gas in the transition to a climate-neutral economy.

Hungary will take over the V4 presidency from Poland in July.

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