Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has called for new development projects to be realized in Hungary and Croatia’s shared border regions.
The prime minister underlined the importance of intensifying ties between Croatia’s Slavonia region and Hungary’s Baranya County.
PM Orbán, attending the inauguration of a new Hungarian-run student hostel in Osijek (Eszék), north-eastern Croatia, with his Croatian counterpart Andrej Plenković, said that 80-100 years ago Slavonia and Baranya County had been the most prosperous areas of their respective countries. “They envied us, not just for our cultures but also our high standard of living,” PM Orbán said.
According to MTI, the prime minister said Croatians living in Slavonia and Hungarians living in Baranya County tend to think of themselves as living on their countries’ peripheries. “People and communities that think they live on the periphery will never be successful. Only those who believe that their home is the center of the world can be successful.”
PM Orbán said Croatia’s accession to the European Union’s passport-free Schengen zone would greatly help the two countries intensify their cultural, sports, business and political relations. He added that if Croatia and Hungary continued to elect “nationally minded” governments for another ten years, they could bring about “a whole new world” in the border region.
Meanwhile, Plenković said ethnic minorities played a major role in fostering friendly and good neighborly relations between Croatia and Hungary.
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