Speaker of the Hungarian parliament Laszlo Kover told Pobjeda that in the case of his country, entering NATO was the first big step towards EU membership. He believes that the same would be true for Montenegro.
“Hungary has waited six years after joining the alliance to become an EU member state. I think it will happen earlier in Montenegro’s case,” says Kover.
As he pointed out, Hungary will do everything to speed up Montenegro’s accession to the EU.
“Montenegro’s accession into NATO is a historic moment for the country and its citizens. We are very pleased that Hungary, among others, played certain role in Montenegro’s NATO integration. This is very important for all neighbouring countries, as it will increase stability in the region,” said Kover.
In his opinion, Montenegro is a positive example, whereas Macedonia is a bad one.
“We can see what is happening in the country where integrations are hampered. Of course, the greatest responsibility lies with the authorities in Skopje, but international organisations hold certain responsibility as well. So, Macedonia has been ready for NATO for six years, but it is delayed because of the veto coming from one member state over Macedonia’s name. The European Commission hasn’t made sufficient efforts to deal with this problem and we have the consequences,” he said.
Commenting on Russia’s influence in the region, particularly Montenegro, Kover explained that the great powers often acted completely irrationally.
“And it is not only the case with Russia. The big problem is that the region from the Adriatic Sea over the Black Sea to the Baltic has been used as a zone of conflict between East and West since the Second World War. We saw what happened in Ukraine,” he said.
He added that big countries were often manipulating small ones and always took care of their own interests. Kover said that small countries like Hungary and Montenegro were not powerful enough to counter such manipulation on their own, which is why joining such organisations as NATO and EU was a good idea for them.
“But even in these organisations we must fight for our national interests and we – the small countries – must act united. We must not let our equality to be called into question. Hungary has had a limited success in those terms, but it wouldn’t have achieved even that if it hadn’t cooperated with Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia in the framework of the Visegrad Four,” said Kover.
He pointed out that it was very important for the Balkan countries to cherish a strong friendship when they enter the EU and NATO.
