The Ukrainian Foreign Ministry has handed a protest note to the acting Hungarian chargé d’affairs in Kiev.
László Csaba Pap was handed the note for what Ukraine regards as Hungary’s inteference and hostility.
According to Magyar Idők, Hungary has recently appointed István Grezsa as ministerial commissioner for the development of Subcarpathia and the development of Hungarian nurseries in the Carpathian basin.
The Subcarpathian region of Ukraine – currently home to some 160,000 ethnic Hungarians – has been part of the Hungarian Kingdom and subsequently the Austro-Hungarian Empire, but since the closing stages of WWI has in turn been part of the West Ukrainian National Republic, Romania, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, the independent Republic of Carpato-Ukraine and after world war two was a province of the Ukrainian SSR, until the breakup of the Soviet Union.
The region lies northeast of Hungary and its ethnic Hungarian population represents just over 12 percent of the total population of the Zakarpattia Oblast. Hungary has to various degrees assisted ethnic Hungarian minorities in the Carpathian basin since its regime change in 1989 but a more consistent aid policy has been established by the government of Viktor Orbán since 2010.
The Ukrainian Foreign Ministry said that the appointment of the ministerial commissioner whose title includes the name of a Ukrainian region is interference in the state’s internal affairs. It also protested against Orbán’s speech on July 28 in Tusványos, Transylvania in which he said that Ukraine’s EU and NATO membership aspirations are unrealistic. Ukraine interpreted this as a sign that Hungary chose a path of confrontation instead of cooperation.
István Grezsa told Magyar Idők that the Ukrainian allegations are totally unfounded and that Hungary has always sought cooperation with the Ukrainian authorities.
Tamas Menczer added that Ukraine is unable to make progress in the process of accession to the European Union and NATO through its own fault and Hungary has nothing to do with it.
