The Diplomat
Katalin Tóth, Hungary’s ambassador to Madrid officially inaugurated the Hungarian Presidency of the Council of the European Union for the second half of 2024 at a reception held at the beginning of July.
The event was attended by senior officials from Spanish ministries, ambassadors from EU Member States and EU candidate countries, representatives of the economic, cultural and press world. The reception was sponsored by the Agrarian Promotion Center.
The keynote speakers were Balázs Orbán, Political Director of the Prime Minister of Hungary, and Fernando Sampedro Marcos, State Secretary for the European Union at the Spanish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, European Union and Cooperation. The former used a story to illustrate the importance of courageous decision-making and prudence going hand in hand. “Doing so can help us achieve our foreign policy objectives,” he said.
In his speech, Fernando Sampedro Marcos welcomed the Presidency of the Council of the European Union for the second half of 2024, which will hold Hungary as the third member of the Spanish-Belgian-Hungarian trio. He also praised the country’s “honest mediator” role, which will be especially necessary to ensure a smooth institutional transition. Among the priorities of the Hungarian Presidency, the Secretary of State highlighted “cohesion policy and competitiveness as two issues on which it is essential to make effective progress”.
