“The migration crisis is one of the most serious in Europe since the Second World War”, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Péter Szijjártó told Hungarian news agency MTI by telephone following Thursday’s meeting of Foreign Ministers from the Visegrád Group, Baltic and Northern European countries in Latvia.
“The European Union and Europe itself hasn’t had to face so many and such serious challenges since the end of the Second World War. One of the most serious of these challenges is undoubtedly the immigration crisis, which poses a major security challenge to Europe, and adding to the problem is the fact that European institutions are continuing to try and solve the issue using a solution that has already proven a failure in view of the fact that all prior experience indicates that proposals for a solution based on a quota do not work. While European institutions continue to force this solution, Europe will be heading for a dead end”, the politician explained.
“According to Hungary, it is now time to begin thinking about how we can reduce the pressure on Europe’s borders instead of thinking about how we could bring even more people into the territory of the European Union. We believe that a distribution of burdens must be preceded by a reduction of burdens, and accordingly we remain firmly behind the reinforcement of the EU’s external borders. All the more, because without the protection of our external borders the Schengen Area will be endangered and the possible collapse of the Schengen Area would have dramatic consequences, dramatic economic consequences, for the countries of the Visegrád Group”, the Minister stressed.
“The countries of the Visegrád Group are the hinterland of German industry, which in turn forms the backbone of Europe’s economy. If the Schengen Area collapses, the previously developed production system of the modern German manufacturing industry will also become uncompetitive, because the modern German manufacturing industry is to a large extent dependent on the predictability of supply deliveries and if Schengen collapses this competitive advantage will disappear”, Mr. Szijjártó explained.
“The other topic of Thursday’s talks was energy security. Here in Central Europe the situation is still not reassuring in view of the fact that North-South infrastructures remain lacking. Both Croatia and Romania should have enabled two-way gas flow between themselves and Hungary a long time ago. However, promising negotiations are now underway with the new Croatian and Romanian governments and we have high hopes that we will be able to purchase natural gas via both the Hungarian-Croatian and Hungarian-Romanian interconnectors from 2019”, the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade told the press.
“We would at the same time like to make it clear that it is unacceptable if the European Commission once again applies a double standard, because plans for the South Stream (gas pipeline) failed as a result of resistance from the Commission and other EU institutions, while for the moment there are no sounds of loud protest from European institutions with relation to the North Stream (gas pipeline)”, Mr. Szijjártó added.
(Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade/MTI)
