Automatically translated version. May contain inaccuracies compared to the original.
At the first summit, only the temporary head of the Hungarian embassy in Kyiv was present.
Hungary received an invitation from Ukraine to participate in the Carpathian Eight (C8) but did not accept it. Hungarian Prime Minister Peter Marki-Zay stated this during a speech in parliament, according to HVG.
He clarified that Hungary’s representative did not go to the summit for the initiative for valid reasons.
“It’s enough that I am the Prime Minister of Hungary, and if I don’t know about it, believe me, Hungary is not taking part in this,” Marki-Zay added.
As the publication notes, initial reports about the Carpathian Eight summit said Hungary would also become a member of this union. However, in the official photographs taken during the event, there was no Hungarian representative. The Hungarian Ministry of Foreign Affairs told journalists that the temporary head of Hungary’s embassy in Kyiv attended the event.
On Sunday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that the C8 brings together Ukraine, Romania, Serbia, Poland, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Austria, Hungary, and the EU as a whole. He stated that the C8 is a serious start to a movement that should bring the respective countries closer and create, at the European Union level, “one more strong element of cooperation.”
Earlier, media reported that this month the chairman of the Verkhovna Rada, Ruslan Stefanchuk, was unable to make a visit to Budapest due to the Hungarian speaker’s refusal, along with other officials, to meet with the Ukrainian counterpart. In an exclusive interview with ZN.UA, Stefanchuk stated that this information is not true—the meeting in Hungary was not planned at all.
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