2024-07-13 02:53:19
Lithuania will reduce its political representation at events in Hungary, and the country’s president Gitans Nausėdas will decide on his visit to Budapest in consultation with other European Union leaders, Žigimants Pavilonis, chairman of the Foreign Affairs Commission of the Lithuanian Parliament, and several sources in the government, who wished to remain anonymous, confirmed to the BNS news agency.
“For now, we have decided to simply limit our participation at the political level in Hungary,” said Pavilonis. He assured that both the government and the president agree to such a position.
Budapest, which holds the EU presidency for six months from early July, held an informal meeting of competition ministers on Tuesday, but Lithuania and most other EU member states were represented by lower-level officials.
Lithuania was represented at the meeting by the country’s ambassador to Hungary, Mindaugas Rukštele, although usually such meetings are attended by ministers or vice-ministers. Pavilonis emphasized that Lithuania is united with those who are not satisfied with Orban’s position.
In Brussels and in EU capitals, there is a growing feeling that the Hungarian leader is using the EU presidency for his own purposes, not for EU representation.
News website Euractiv has revealed that several EU countries, including Sweden, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland, will send lower-level officials to the informal ministerial meetings to be held in Budapest in July. Other countries are also considering such a possibility.
Sources in the Lithuanian government told BNS that Lithuania has decided not to participate in the informal ministerial meetings organized by Budapest, however, vice ministers could attend them.
Latvia and Estonia will also act similarly, the sources indicated. And also the largest EU members, such as France and Germany, reducing their representation at the meetings held in Hungary, BNS reports.
“Hungary’s behavior during the presidency is disastrous (..). That is why Sweden will not participate at the political level in the unofficial ministerial meetings in July,” Swedish Minister of European Affairs Jessica Rosewall told the Swedish news agency TT.
Regardless of the presiding country, Lithuanian ministers will continue to participate in formal EU Council meetings held in Brussels.
A European Council summit is due to take place in Hungary within the next six months, but it is not yet clear whether Nausicaä will boycott it. “The position on participation in the events taking place in Hungary will be coordinated with partners in the EU,” the Lithuanian President’s Office informed.
Orbán has angered EU leaders by making an unannounced visit to Ukraine on the first day of Hungary’s EU presidency, and a few days later visiting Russia, where he met with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin.
The Prime Minister of Hungary tried to present his visit to Russia as a diplomatic step of the EU, as well as the dictator declared an international wanted.
“This is not only unacceptable, but also violates several political agreements at the highest level, for example, on non-cooperation with Putin’s regime, which has been accepted even at the level of the European Council,” emphasized the chairman of the Foreign Affairs Commission of the Lithuanian Seimas. “That is not the position of the EU and it is against our position,” he added.
Nausicaa, who attended this week’s NATO summit in Washington, condemned Orbán’s visit to Moscow, saying that while Hungary holds the EU presidency, its prime minister does not represent the bloc’s interests.
Other member states also expressed their dissatisfaction at the regular meeting of EU ambassadors in Brussels on Wednesday.
In the liberal faction of the European Parliament (EP) “Renew Europe” (“Renew Europe”) there have been calls to deprive Hungary of the EU presidency.
Sources in the faction revealed that it is possible to consider various measures, including prematurely terminating the Hungarian presidency or speeding up the start of the Polish presidency.
However, the EU member states did not discuss the options for dealing with this issue this week, and there is no apparent desire to shorten the term of the presidency, EU diplomats told Euractiv this week.
2024-07-13 02:53:19