Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjártó insisted on Monday, during his first visit to Ukraine since the start of the Russian invasion, that the authorities in Kyiv must give more rights to the country’s Hungarian minority in order to improve relations with Budapest. according to EFE, reports Agerpres.

A bilateral commission to settle differences between the two countries

In turn, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine, Dmytro Kuleba, announced that the parties agreed to create a bilateral commission to resolve within ten days the differences between the two parties regarding the issue of the Hungarian minority in Ukraine.

On a more optimistic note, Kuleba called the atmosphere of the meeting “open, honest” and “constructive” and emphasized that both delegations demonstrated a desire “to resolve this issue in good faith.”

In December, the Hungarian government used its EU veto, thus blocking the approval of a multi-year aid package of 50 billion euros proposed by Brussels for Ukraine, which will be sent to Kyiv over the next four years.

The approval of these funds will be discussed again at the European Council, which will meet on February 1.

“We demand that the Hungarian national community in (the Ukrainian region of) Transcarpathia be given back the rights it already had in 2015,” Szijarto was quoted as saying by Hungarian news portal telex.hu, referring to the reason cited by Budapest for its opposition to the extension. providing aid to Ukraine.

After the ouster of the last pro-Russian president of Ukraine, Viktor Yanukovych, in the wake of the Maidan in 2014, Kyiv adopted a number of laws aimed at consolidating Ukrainian as the only state language and the language of public communication, in a country where Russian is used in everyday communication by a large part of citizens .

These laws also affected the status of other minority languages ​​in Ukraine, such as Hungarian and Romanian, EFE notes.

One of the measures demanded by Hungary is aimed at ensuring that Ukrainians of Hungarian origin can attend high school in their native language and that this language is used “without restrictions in higher education, culture, public administration and community life,” the Hungarian emphasized. Foreign minister.

A multi-year EU aid package of 50 billion euros from Hungary

Ukraine hopes Monday’s meeting in the western Ukrainian city of Uzhgorod will help break Hungary’s resistance to approving a European aid package for Kyiv, which is due to be voted on this week.

Encouraging steps have been taken to restore the atmosphere of trust between Hungary and Ukraine, although the road ahead “is long and a lot of work will be required,” Peter Szijarto said at the end of six-hour talks with his Ukrainian counterpart, adding that Hungary is ready for these efforts, MTI reports.

According to Szijarto, Hungary’s position on Ukraine has been clear and consistent over the past two years. “We support the territorial integrity and sovereignty of Ukraine. We condemn the war and want peace in the neighborhood,” said the head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Hungary.

He called for renewed efforts to restore peace in Ukraine. “Hungary is ready to continue making such efforts because we know that lives can only be saved when there is peace,” Szijjarto said, quoted by MTI.

EU plans to sabotage Hungary’s economy in case of Viktor Orbán’s veto

A confidential document obtained by the Financial Times and cited by Reuters shows that the European Union will threaten Hungary with sabotaging its economy if Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban blocks aid to Ukraine and at a summit of the bloc’s leaders this week.

The document, obtained by the FT, shows that officials in Brussels have drawn up a strategy aimed at clearly tackling the weaknesses of the Hungarian economy, threatening the stability of the forint and causing a drop in investor confidence to damage jobs and the economy. growth if Orbán continues to use his veto to block aid to Ukraine.

The document states that “in case of failure to reach an agreement [summitul de] On February 1, other heads of state and government will publicly state that, given the non-constructive behavior of the Prime Minister of Hungary (…) they cannot imagine that Budapest will be offered EU funds.