“Until there is unity and stability in Libya and the protection of its southern border is resolved, a major risk will continue to exist with relation to Europe’s security”, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Péter Szijjártó declared in Brussels on Monday in the recess of a meeting of EU foreign ministers.

At his press conference, the Hungarian Foreign Minister highlighted: “One of the main reasons for migration is the fact that some North African countries are extremely unstable. This is also the case with relation to Libya, where there is no uniformly represented state, meaning that the Libyan Government of National Accord only controls a small portion of the country’s territory.  A solution to the Libyan situation is also being hampered by the fact the there is a total lack of international consensus with relation to its acceptance”.

“Until the protection of Libya’s southern border is resolved, people smugglers will be able to perform their activities unhindered. Furthermore, the longer the country remains unstable, the longer the terrorist organisations will continue to operate”, Mr. Szijjártó underlined.

“Hungary continues to stress that the first step towards solving the migration crisis should be the protection of the EU’s external borders. According to the standpoint of Hungary and several other European countries, protecting Libya’s southern border could represent a solution. In the interests of this goal, and in a show of solidarity, in December the Visegrád Group (V4) countries decided to provide 35 million euros for the full financing of the second phase of the EU programme aimed, amongst others, at the protection of Libya’s border, in addition to offering their cooperation towards the programme’s implementation”, the Minister told the press.

“If the European Union is incapable of protecting Libya’s southern border, then the wave of illegal migration will be able to continue unabated. In turn, migration will further exacerbate the European debate on the mandatory quotas, because the more immigrants enter Europe, the more immigrants need to be distributed. This must be prevented”, the Minister emphasised.

Mr. Szijjártó also told reporters that Hungary has moved its Embassy back to Tripoli and the foreign representation will begin full operations in the spring, thereby expressing the European expectation according to which the European Union regards Libya’s Government of National Accord as its partner.

With relation to migration, the Minister said that during the debate he had also made it clear that the Hungarian Government supports the European Union developing further partnerships with African, Caribbean and Pacific states, and that in his opinion the payment of funding must be tied to strict conditions.

“Billions of euros cannot be paid out for development programmes aimed at enabling people to stay at home, while the countries that receive this funding remain the source and transit countries for migration”, he declared, stressing that: “In exchange for development funding, beneficiary countries must be required to introduce the necessary political and economic reforms”.

In reply to a question from the press, the Hungarian Foreign Minister declared that international law is on Hungary’s side with relation to the Paks 2 nuclear power plant project. “The decisions of the European Commission, according to which Hungary has received all of the permits required to realise the project, are clear”, he said. “Within the European Union, the right to decide what energy sources a county wants to use falls within a national sphere of competence. In view of the fact that the decisions of the European Commission are based on international law, Hungary has nothing to worry about”, he added.

“In view of the fact that the legal foundations of the project are rock solid, we don’t have to worry about any kind of international procedure or about the project’s schedule running late”, the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade stressed.

(Cabinet Office of the Prime Minister/MTI)