- Slovakia and the Czech Republic will restore the format of joint government negotiations.
- Fico is also planning a meeting with the Czech and Austrian prime ministers in the Slavkov format.
- After July 1, Slovakia will take over the presidency of the Vyšehrad Four.
- Both prime ministers want to try to return Poland to the V4.
Slovakia and the Czech Republic will return to the format of joint government negotiations. The Prime Minister of the Slovak Republic Robert Fico (Smer-SD) and the Prime Minister of the Czech Republic Andrej Babiš agreed on the continuation at Thursday’s meeting in Bratislava. The next meeting should take place in the Czech Republic on March 31. This follows from the statements of Fico and Babiš at a joint press conference as part of the Czech Prime Minister’s visit to Slovakia.
“At today’s meeting with the Prime Minister, we agreed that we will continue the format of joint government negotiations. The agreement also consists in the fact that the next meeting will take place on the territory of the Czech Republic,” he announced Fico.
At the same time, he plans to convene a meeting with the Czech Prime Minister and Austrian Chancellor Christian Stocker in Slovakia as soon as possible within the framework of the Slavkov format, which Slovakia presides over. He also mentioned the upcoming informal summit, which will be held on February 12. He called it a very important negotiation, it will also concern competitiveness.
After July 1, Slovakia takes over the presidency of the Vyšehrad Four (V4). “We will be extremely active and we will do everything in order for the V4 to regain the strength it used to have in the past. The strength that consisted in the ability of the four EU member states to independently create positions and positions that were able to move the internal life of Brussels,” declared Fico alongside Babiš. He respects that the dynamics of V4 life will be affected by the elections that await Hungary in April.
Babiš thinks that the V4 worked perfectly. “We had clear results, we prevented the quotas of illegal migration, we enforced the taxonomy,” declared the Czech Prime Minister at the press conference. He emphasized that Poland is important within the V4. “I talked about it in the framework of the European Council and in Paris with Prime Minister Donald Tusk, and I will certainly try for some bilateral negotiations. Of course, it is about the strained relationship between Poland and Hungary,” he concluded.
Together with Fico, they therefore want to try to persuade Poland to return to this format, so that the topic of talks is only European topics. “I think that could work because Poland has always been the most important within the V4. At least I speak for me and we talked about it together that we can try,” he added Grandma. He would also like to participate in a meeting within the framework of the Slavkov format, which could be held in Slovakia in February.
