Following the meeting of European foreign ministers in Luxembourg, where Macedonia was again denied a date to open EU accession talks, Hungarian chief diplomat Peter Szijjarto said that it is a shameful decision. Hungary was a leading member of the group of a dozen main central European countries who pushed for the opening of accession talks in face of liberal opposition from France and the Netherlands.

Unfortunately there is no decision to open accession talks. The decision was to revert to this issue in October. That is shameful. We should have decided to open the accession talks right now. Everything was at our disposal, there is no reason, no obstacle to delay. The only reason was the lack of political will. Some countries cited the lack of time, which was ridiculous. Macedonia has been a candidate for 14 years. Albania for five. It is laughable to say there was no time. There were two weeks since the European Commission report was out, and you can hold a session of Parliament in two weeks, on a report which contained nothing unexpected. The decision not to open accession talks damages the EU perspective for the Balkans We are a neighboring region and we know how important it is to continue to process of enlargement. The Visegrad group asked for a decision immediately, but the Western European countries argued against, Szijjarto said.

The Hungarian Foreign Minister also said that there is no telling what will happen in October. “Nobody can guarantee what will be the decision of the Bundestag”, he added.