The Government has been committed to correcting mistaken decisions of the past, and is therefore continuing with its policy of keeping fiscal deficit under 3 percent and reducing general government debt.
There are no plans to sell Mol shares owned by the state; they comprise an extra security reserve for the financing of the state budget – the Ministry for National Economy stated on Thursday.
At the Hungarian-German Forum in Berlin on November 8, Minister of State in charge of European Affairs at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Enikő Győri declared that EU member states should not let „new walls rise within the European Union”.
Deputy State Secretary for International Communications Ferenc Kumin paid a visit to London, where he held a lecture at an event organized by the Policy Research and Analysis Centre Federal Trust.
Foreign Minister János Martonyi conducted bilateral talks with Surapong Tovichakchaikul, the Foreign Minister of Thailand on the sidelines of the 9th Summit of the ASEM-Asia-Europe Meeting.
State Secretary for Foreign Affairs Zsolt Németh decorated Ambassador of Montenegro, Vanja Brajlo.
Deputy Prime Minister Zsolt Semjén and Archbishop Mark (Golovkov) of the Russian Orthodox Church signed a cooperation agreement that defines the responsibilities of the government and the church.
Cultural diplomacy should make full use of the interest currently being shown in Hungary around the world, Ministry of Human Resources Zoltán Balog, told Hungarian cultural diplomats on Thursday.
A trend reversal has been under way in 2012 as general government debt has been declining and state budget deficit could be reduced to below 3 percent of GDP, said Minister of State Zoltán Cséfalvay from the Ministry for National Economy on Thursday, at a conference in Budapest.
„The Hungarian government regards it as its moral and political obligation to face past violations of rights connected to the dictatorships of the twentieth century,” Parliamentary State Secretary Zsolt Németh declared in his opening remarks at the Fifth Budapest Human Rights Forum on November 8.
The 22nd assembly of the Hungarian-German Forum, which was launched by German Chancellor Helmut Kohl and late Hungarian Prime Minister József Antall in 1991, began in Berlin on November 8. More than forty politicians, experts and scholars – including the German and the Hungarian Foreign Minister – attend the two-day forum.
Hungarian Foreign Minister János Martonyi held talks with his Sir Lankan counterpart Gamini Lakshman Peiris November 8, 2012. The parties agreed on restarting political cooperation and strengthening economic and trade relations.
On Wednesday at the opening of a meeting for the directors of the Balassi Institute – which coordinates Hungarian cultural institutes abroad – the Minister of Public Administration and Justice said that it is a national strategy goal for there to be one Hungarian institute in each Central European country.
Changes in Hungarian public administration and infrastructure development in the border region were discussed at the Hungarian-Austrian Regional Coordination Forum’s latest meeting on Wednesday in the town of Körmend, Hungary.
In the third quarter of 2012 the number of employed people increased by almost 80 000 compared to the corresponding period of the previous year, and simultaneously the employment rate among those aged 15-74 years has reached the level of 51.4 percent which has been the best figure of the past ten years. The increase in employment has been the consequence of the labour market measures of the Government and the optimal organization of public employment schemes. Going forward, the Government adheres to its aim of introducing potent measures in order to sustain these positive tendencies in the field of public employment schemes and by stimulating hiring and investment in the private sector. The Job Protection Action Plan has been one of the instruments for fulfilling this purpose.
Hungary considers it very important that the European Union should increasingly promote the policy of free trade and the upcoming Irish presidency of the EU is likely to support this trend, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said on Thursday after meeting Irish counterpart Taoiseach Enda Kenny.
V. Budapest Human Rights Forum
Budapest, 8 November 2012
On Wednesday evening Prime Minister Viktor Orbán received Kevin Turner, Vice President of Microsoft in the Parliament Building.
State Secretary for Rural Development Zsolt V. Németh and Magdaléna Lacko-Bartošová, Slovakian State Secretary of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, discussed the two countries' experiences with regard to local processing and distribution at a meeting held at the Hungarian Ministry of Rural Development with the aim of making preparations for the upcoming session of the Hungarian-Slovak Joint Committee on Agriculture.
At a press conference held in the recess of high-level talks organised in Budapest on Wednesday, State Secretary of the Tunisian Ministry that supervises international trade relations and foreign investment Alaya Bettaieb declared that economic relations between Hungary and Tunisia may be significantly expanded.
According to the Minister for National Economy György Matolcsy, the European Commission has awarded a good mark for Hungarian economic policy, and thus the excessive deficit procedure against Hungary can be abrogated next year. It is a great success, Minister Matolcsy emphasised, that the structural balance of the budget has been improved in excess of EU requirements, achieving an increase of over 2%.
Viktor Orbán concluded a Strategic Partnership Agreement with Alcoa-Köfém Ltd. on Wednesday. In a speech held at the signing ceremony in Parliament, the Prime Minister emphasized that there are some multinational companies that do not take away their profits from Hungary; on the contrary, they reintegrate them into the Hungarian economy.
Minister of Human Resources Zoltán Balog declared in Paris that the fact that the French socialists and the Hungarian centre-right government have launched similar programs in many areas is a signal that the classical right-left wing ideological oppositions are rolling back in the act of solving concrete social problems like the integration of Roma people, employment, the issue of culture support and the employment of women.
Following negotiations with several members of the French government, the Minister of Human Resources emphasized the public work connected to education and signified that a lot of his French partners had congratulated Hungary on its pioneering role in the European Roma strategy.
In the past two years Hungary has achieved significant results regarding general government debt, recently one of the most widely observed indicators all around the world.
Key data of the central sub sector of the state budget in October 2012.