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Main issues

* Priorities of the Hungarian Presidency
* Economic Governance
* Europe 2020 Strategy
* Changing Europe
* Enlargement
* Eastern Partnership
* Developing European Roma Policy
* The Danube Region Strategy
* Cultural diversity and the European Year of Volunteering


Priorities of the Hungarian Presidency

The Hungarian Presidency of the Council of the European Union wishes to build its political agenda around the human factor, focusing on four main topics: growth and employment for preserving the European social model; stronger Europe; citizen friendly Union; enlargement and neighbourhood policy.

From 1st January 2011, it is going to be task of the Hungarian Presidency of the Council of the European Union to shape the issues on the agenda of the European Union in line with the interests of the 27 Member States. In order to maintain the course amidst its many obligations, the Hungarian Presidency has defined the topics that it considers to be of outstanding significance. The Hungarian Presidency wishes to work along four priorities during the first half of 2011. Beside this, it intends to keep in the focus point the human factor, as the basis for intelligent, sustainable and inclusive growth when dealing with all other issues ranging from the economy, through common policies to the issue of enlargement.

Growth and employment for preserving the European social model

The entire Union is defined by a period of economic rearrangement. The Hungarian Presidency will continue the process of consolidation. It is convinced that the key to success is in the future oriented growth strategy of the EU and in the reinforcement of economic policy coordination.

The Europe 2020 strategy wishes to improve or to preserve the living conditions of European citizens, therefore it has to have the creation of jobs and sustainable competitiveness in the focus. Thus the Hungarian Presidency wishes to improve the situation of small and medium enterprises, which are the drivers for job creation and also wishes to call the attention of Member States to the impact that demography and family policy can have on employment and economic growth. In the framework of the initiative to decrease poverty, the Presidency wishes to pay increased attention to the struggle against child poverty and will strive for tangible, European-level measures in the field of the integration of the Roma-people.

Stronger Europe

The internal policies of the EU are structured around three basic elements: food, energy and water. Therefore the Hungarian Presidency attaches great importance to strengthen policies in these fields, thereby also reinforcing Europe. The review of the Common Agriculture Policy, the definition of a common energy policy and a new area, the drafting of a European water policy all serve this purpose. Parallel to the debate on preserving water resources, the European strategy on the development of the Danube-region will also be adopted during the Hungarian Presidency.

Hungary wishes to conduct a real and tangible debate on the afore-mentioned issues. This is indispensable in order to make sure that these policies that strength cohesion and solidarity between Member States provide a solid foundation for the next multi-annual financial framework of the Union.

Citizen friendly Union

The EU also has to deal with issues that have a direct relevance on the everyday lives of citizens. Thus Hungary intends to further the implementation of the Stockholm Program, to move forward the enlargement of the Schengen area to include Bulgaria and Romania in order to provide a free movement of people and to protect fundamental rights. Beside all these, it is the objective of the Hungarian Presidency to direct the attention of Member States to cultural diversity as a European value that needs to be protected. Cultural diversity will be a defining theme of cultural events during the Presidency.

Enlargement and neighbourhood policy

Hungary wishes to pay particular attention to taking the enlargement process further and to providing an integration perspective for the Western Balkans region. The Hungarian Presidency will do everything it can to conclude the accession talks with Croatia during the first half of 2011. It is also a priority objective to strengthen the Eastern dimension of the neighbourhood policy, in the framework of which, Hungary will host the second Eastern Partnership Summit in May 2011.



During the presidency our promotion video will be this:

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Gödöllő

During the Hungarian Presidency informal ministerial meetings will be held mostly at the former royal residence in Gödöllő located 30 km East of Budapest. Although it is Hungary’s largest Baroque Palace, visitors expecting an enormous building usually find the view surprisingly small at first glance. Tamás Ujváry, deputy manager of the Royal Palace of Gödöllő explains this effect with the location of the entrance, which has a view to the street rather than the gardens and is not situated between the two wings of the U-shaped building, as was customary with Baroque palaces. This way only the narrow front of the main building can be seen from the street while the wings attached to the U-shaped building are concealed by trees.

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http://www.civertan.hu/legifoto/galery_image.php?id=2377

Presidency budget

Hungary will be spending a total of HUF 23,78 billion for the Presidency tasks, which at currency rates of the end of November are close to EUR 85 billion. This can be considered to be a provident budget, noting that the budgets of Presidencies of previous years were between EUR 80-150 million. (Although it is difficult to appreciate the actual spending of previous Presidencies due to the difference in accounting practices.) The Hungarian government will endeavour to use tax-payers’ money in the most efficient manner possible.

Rotating Presidency

The Spain–Belgium–Hungary trio is the first Presidency to function totally in accordance with the Lisbon rules. The three countries commonly elaborated the programme of the 18 month long Presidency period. This programme determines the planning of dossiers and legislative proposals that will form part of the agenda, as well as the planning of events, mainly the meetings of heads of state and government, and of meetings at ministerial levels. The three countries also have a shared logo for the Presidency. The presidential trios hold regular discussions as well. Hence, Hungary puts strong emphasis on cooperating with the Polish Presidency, the first in office of the next trio. Particularly those issues are in focus, which are related to the common energy policy and the eastern dimension of the EU's neighbourhood policy.



Finally, I would like to ask everybody to conversate in English in this topic, those members who are want to talk about the Presidency in Hungarian please do this in the "Politika és miegymás" topic.

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This speech is truly epic, it's a classic example of a very basic mistake in argumentation., known as the straw man.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_man

Mr. Cohn (az első Kohn, aki egyben Grün is:)) has a long and passionate speech rightfully criticising the direct oppression of free speech and the elimination of critical voices in the media. The problem is that the thing he criticises does not exist, because our media law does not contain such things. I realize that awakening strong emotions in the audience is a powerful way of creating a supportive atmosphere but it frightens me that it's not expected from a politician even at a cental EU level to be able to avoid basic fallacies of argumentation or have the slightest urge to check facts before ranting for minutes like an unemployed alcoholic in a commieblock pub.

I like to keep in touch with what's going in Europe, its close to my heart.

I was slightly annoyed when the prime minister was lectured in the EU Parliament by a two firebrand MPs on the enduring values of European free speech.

Let me share with you a story of how ancient Hungarian democracy is. I can first tell you full Hungarian democracy is alive and well today!

Hungary is one of the oldest and most enduring nations in Europe. It is 58 years younger than Germany and France (Treaty of Verdun 837), it is older than England (1066), older than Spain and Portugal, older than Italy, older than Poland, older then Russia, older than any Scandinavian country. When the freedom-seeking Magyar tribes entered the Carpathian Basin in 895, they entered as a proud confederation with strong traditions of sociocracy (election by consent) leadership not tribalism.

Prior to entering Hungary to permanently settle down, the confederation enjoyed an idyllic, romantic unencumbered equestrian existence on the steppes of Russia, where the vast limitless expanse of the prairie -- the physical and spiritual dimensions of freedom and liberty flourished. It was here that the Hungarians' vast reservoir for the love of freedom can be first discernably identified and have a genesis. This undampened spirit in Hungarians has endured since the 800s.

When Hungary was transformed into a stalwart Christian nation in 1000, its visionary first King St. Stephen sent welcoming envoys to all European countries as far as Flanders to have a diverse strata of European peoples settle Hungary and help populate the newly created Apostolic Kingdom.

Hungary is proud to be host to the first Autonomous Law in the world in 1224 granted to Transylvanian Saxons settlers, the Knights Templars and Knights Hospitallers that highlighted an enlightened sense of human dignity for autonomy in Hungarian rulers.

Hungary is even more proud to be second in the world for drafting a quasi-parlimentary constitution barely 7 years after the English Magna Carta in 1222. Hungary was the first continental European monarchy to write just a seminal piece of legislation that cements Hungary as a vanguard in European democracy.

Hungary's commitment to European security, integrity and liberty has been more than steadfast as a veritable sword and shield of Christian Europe since the times of the Crusades. Hungary has always considered itself the easternmost strategic bastion and periphery of the West that merits examination.

It was Hungary's senior commitment in military enterprises during the Fifth Crusades that saw the largest royal army ever brought into theater. It wasn't English King Richard the Lionheart or German Emperor Frederick Barbarrosa that brought in the largest European field army in the history of the Crusades. It was Hungary's King Andrew II with 20,000 knights and 12,000 garrison soldiery that decided matters and left the campaign undefeated.

It was Hungary's unshakable 200 year defense of Europe as a central bastion of European liberty and freedom against overwhelming odds from Turkish Moslem invasions aimed at universal Muslim aggrandizement -- that secured Hungary's Western European partners' destiny to captain far-flung maritime and colonial empires overseas. It was with Herculean diligence, brow and sinew that Hungary was able to hurl back the fanatical assaults of the Ottoman Empire destined to vanquish Europe to add a glowing chaoter to the development of modern Europe.
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Hungary held fast militariliy "the gates to Europe" with tremendous sacrifices in blood and treasure for all Europeans. It was this Hungarian critical central defense that was the enabler for Western Europeans' discovery towards economic, technological and imperial growth, enlightenment, with a new recourse to scientific, political and civic thought.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/61/II._R%C3%A1k%C3%B3czi_Ferenc_M%C3%A1nyoki.jpg/250px-II._R%C3%A1k%C3%B3czi_Ferenc_M%C3%A1nyoki.jpg
Hungary has produced an amazing number of independence-driven leaders. Prince Francis Rakoczi - the nation's greatest and most powerful aristocrat eschewed a secure life of leisure, indolence and luxury in the Habsburg court to personally lead a popular peasant uprising against absolutism that turned into full-fledged War of Independence in Hungary. He fought valiantly with his patriotic forces as a national iconic hero for 8 years in his struggle for freedom.
http://crowland.uw.hu/images/csata/kossuth_lajos.jpg
Regent-Governor Louis Kossuth, writer, orator, essayist, liberator, patriot, revolutionary, the main bellwether for European democracy in the 19th century, the most famous Hungarian and Freemason of the 19th century. Kossuth was the destined "George Washington" for the Hungarian people before the iron ring of Czarist Russia intervened to crush the ephemeral Hungarian democratic republic in 1849.
http://coffeeforclosers.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/hungary-56-budapest-demonstration.jpg
The Revolution of 1956 in Hungary against communist totalitarism showed the world the prospects that ran counter to the unachievable and impossible -- a small nation's burning insatiable desire for freedom, human dignity from oppression against the unsurpassable, against the greatest dictatorship the world has ever seen. 1956 ignited the world and showed the human face and human spirit in obdurate struggle and contention with totalitarian forces bent on complete state subjection. The 1956 Revolution put the major dent into communism as an inreconciable idea with human liberty and dignity.
http://thevieweast.files.wordpress.com/2009/08/cutting-the-iron-curtain.jpg?w=300&h=240
It was the Hungary that first cut down the Iron Curtain as a goodwill gesture towards West Germany knowing the writing on the wall had appeared -- communism was going to be dismantled physically by Hungarian visionary leaders first. Hardline communism had disappeared in Hungary by the 1970s, replaced by "goulash communism" in the "happiest barracks in the Eastern Block" (Hungary) an admixture of socialist and small enterprise capitalism where 1/3 of the economy was privatized in small enterpernurial ventures. So good were relations of Hungary to the United States in the late 1970s, President Jimmy Carter returned the Holy Crown of St. Stephen from Fort Knox in 1977 to their rightful owners, the freedom loving Hungarians.

In summation, Hungary doesn't need to be lectured on the virtues of freedom of speech and democracy. Hungary has a 1000 year history of experimenting with, striving and fighting for and defending democracy and the freedom of speech. Democracy is alive and well in Hungary today. European people everywhere should be proud to have Hungary chair the European Presidency with its optimistic diligent robust programme of European revitalization and common purpose.

-- The Ombudsman

^^ You show nice examples about how democratic the leaders of Hungary has been during the ages. A very simplified but honorable approach of a romantic Hungarian history, however no explanation why did some 1 million Hungarians emmigrate from this traditionally so democratic country to US, to a realised state of freemason liberty.

I am very proud for being Hungarian, but do not believe that any criticism (which you may call lecturing) will harm us. Criticism is part of the everyday life IF done on a cultured, intelligent level.

I feel confused now. I really do not understand how may someone state other points of view being untolerable. This is deeply burnt into this discussion from both sides. It is the same human mistake at Mr. Orban and Mr. Cohn-Bendit. None of them will ever accept or understand the other's logic. Killing compromises is killing everything.

BUT!!!

Same day, when Prime Minister Orban has been offended for harming the freedom of speech, oppinion and press, Mr Obama met Mr. Hu, the president of China. Noone was talking about the human and freedom rights situation of China.

Capitalism rulez!

I am very proud for being Hungarian, but do not believe that any criticism (which you may call lecturing) will harm us. Criticism is part of the everyday life IF done on a cultured, intelligent level.

It is the same human mistake at Mr. Orban and Mr. Cohn-Bendit. None of them will ever accept or understand the other's logic. Killing compromises is killing everything.

Windblower, having seen the video, I have to applaud Mr. Cohn-Bendit for saying he cried after Hungary lost the 1954 World Cup. That took class. Mr. Sepp Blatter, current FIFA President also cried when the Hungarians lost 2-3. Mr. Cohn-Bendit said he was emotionally and intellectually involved during the 1956 Hungarian Revolution. That's also class.

What I was slightly annoyed by is Mr. Cohn-Bendit impugning the dignity and common sense of the Hungarian electorate. It was full-fledged Hungarian democracy in action, much of it at the grass-roots level that wanted a fresh start for Hungary; a clean break with 20 years of so-called reforms on a path to self-reliance, dignity and worth. Hungarians definately wanted a change, and many demanded structural reforms, namely in the Constitution, which are urgently needed to fully bring Hungary out of the malaise of a gradualist post-communist future.

Windblower, Mr. Cohn-Bendit, doesn't need to lecture Hungary about the freedom of speech, the media law hasn't sanctioned anybody, it is fully in the norm. Most European countries have a media law or a sanctioning body. In the US, there is the FCC. The media law is in perfect harmony with EU regulations, the findings will bear that out.

What Mr. Cohn-Bendit was upset mostly about is the overwhelming 68% voter approval of the Hungarian public for a center-right government to be formed. Partly jealosy, partly that in one European country substantative values of a different political shade carried the day.

One month past from the six, and i dont even heard any important act yet.. Somebody else?

We have seen a historic, significant, very effective and invariably influential European Presidency in the first half of 2011.

As promised the Presidency presided over by Hungary will move toward a more powerful European unitedness, stronger economic coherence, stability and expansion.

Very strong leadership by Hungary, in fact pioneering and ground-breaking. It was one of the most aggressive revitalizing programmes in recent EU history to replenish the economic strength and grow the common baseline.

"Europe needs to take back the theatre!"

Take back the global theatre if you so desire! Re-introduce a united Europe on a powerful level to the world which has never happened before.

This requires a "Strong Europe" -- this was the motto of the Hungarian Presidency.

Very effective, celebrated and very congradulated work Hungary, most political forces have praises, you made all European people proud and stronger by endearing hard tireless work in the human universe.