"If the European Union does not contribute financial resources to the renovation, modernization, and capacity increase of the South-Eastern European energy transmission network, it will have no legal basis to have a say in where and from whom the countries here buy what energy carriers"

Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Péter Szijjártó announced at a joint press conference with Bosnian Foreign Trade Minister Stasa Kosarac that the Western Balkans has always been extremely important to our country, and that the importance of the region has increased even more following the war in Ukraine.

"It is in Hungary's national security interest that there should be peace, tranquility and security in the Western Balkans. The best tool for creating this is European Union integration and the development of the economy. Therefore, Hungary is committed to supporting the European Union integration of the Western Balkan region, and we also provide support for the development of the economy in the Western Balkans"

Péter Szijjártó expressed his dissatisfaction with the snail-paced expansion process, which, in his words, "could easily cause instability and could easily lead to the Western Balkans possibly aligning itself elsewhere." "Unfortunately, instead of speaking in the voice of mutual respect, education is regularly coming from Brussels in the direction of the Western Balkans. In many cases, in Brussels, they talk about the Western Balkans rather than the Western Balkans, which is quite irresponsible".

He emphasized that the parties attach particular importance to energy security, and that the Turkish Stream natural gas pipeline plays an important role in this for both countries. He believed that in order to guarantee the energy supply of the region, the EU should finally give up the passivity it shows in the matter of increasing the capacity and modernizing the energy infrastructure in South-Eastern Europe.

"This is a European matter. It doesn't work that they want to determine from Brussels where to buy natural gas or crude oil, while they don't help us to develop the infrastructure".

MTI

Featured Image: Facebook