“Romania has issued a statement that is making the improvement of bilateral relations more difficult”, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Péter Szijjártó said in a statement to Hungarian news agency MTI in reaction to Wednesday’s statement by the Romanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

According to the information, the Romanian Foreign Ministry issued a statement about Tuesday’s meeting between Péter Szijjártó and his Romanian counterpart Teodor Melescanu, which took place on the sidelines of an informal meeting of Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) foreign ministers in Štrbské pleso, Slovakia.

In the statement, the Romanian party said Mr. Szijjártó had asked for the “disregarding of the rulings of law enforcement institutions and intervention into the justice system of the Romanian state”, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said.

In reaction, Mr Szijjártó said: “In a state governed by the rule of law that respects European values, it is not those who for instance hold a peaceful demonstration in a cemetery that are punished, but those who attack them”.

“We continue to maintain that it is the duty of Romanian Parliament and the Romanian government to do everything possible and create a suitable legal environment to enable minorities to practice their rights, and so that nobody punishes the members of the national community with ‘horroristic fines’ simply for using their symbols”, the Minister also stated.

(MTI)