V4 Presidents Unanimously Support Serbia's Accession to EU
Lany, October 3 (TASR-correspondent) – After a two-day summit at Lany Castle in the Czech Republic, presidents of the Visegrad Four countries (V4: the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Slovakia) declared that they unanimously support Serbia’s integration into the European Union and their position won’t change in the future, Slovak President Zuzana Caputova said at a joint press conference commenting on EU enlargement to the Western Balkan countries, adding that Slovakia has also been communicating support for Serbia in the long term.
“Slovakia has been communicating support for Serbia in this regard for a long time, of course, after meeting all the conditions and criteria that we, as the Slovak Republic, also had to meet. The gradual transformation process was eventually successful also for us. We adopted a number of reforms and today we’re a country that is integrated and we’re calling for further integration and not for the return of powers to national states,” said Caputova at a joint conference with Czech President Milos Zeman, Polish President Andrzej Duda, Hungarian President Janos Ader and top representatives of Slovenia and Serbia – Borut Pahor and Aleksandar Vucic.
Caputova further stated that the EU brings benefits which people obviously appreciate, according to polls, as Slovakia has “historically the greatest support in relation to the EU”. At the same time, she pointed out that the meeting in Lany was held 30 years after the Velvet Revolution and the fall of the Berlin Wall. According to her, the V4 was created so that the countries could help each other and contribute to the unification of Europe.
At the two-day summit, the presidents discussed the direction of the V4 as well as its position within the EU, the functioning of the European institutions, Brexit, the climate crisis and the rule of law.
The new EU budgetary framework was discussed as well. In this context, Caputova stated that Slovakia, as well as other V4 countries, will be facing some changes in the economy, which are represented by automation and robotisation. She noted that Slovakia is, among other things, awaiting the transformation of the largest brown-coal region and that the new financial framework needs to be looked at in the light of these possible challenges.
The president decided to arrive at the meeting by train. The delegation should return to Slovakia in the evening. It was the first time Caputova participated in the summit of the V4 heads of state since she took her office.
