Hungary, 2025

I now give the floor to His Excellency Peter Szijjarto, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade of Hungary. Mr. President, dear colleagues, Unfortunately, it is not an exaggeration to state that we are now living in the age of dangers, and it's not an exaggeration either to say that since the conclusion of the Second World War, currently we are experiencing the global security being in its worst shape ever. Wars, an increasing threat of terrorism, ethnic-based conflicts, spreading of extreme ideologies, and open reference to the use of nuclear weapons. This is the age of dangers. A period when the world has been faced with the risk of the outbreak of the Third World War. All these conflicts, unfortunately, are pointing to the same direction. The direction that the world will be divided into blocks again. And this would be a very dangerous phenomenon. We Hungarians know it from our historic experience. We have lost 40 years of our lives in an age which was characterized by a world divided into blocks. This is against our national interest. But what is in line with our national interest? It is connectivity. Connectivity meaning that mutual respect should return as a basis of the operation of the system of international cooperation. Such a system would bring mutual benefits to all of us. Hungary's strategy has been to become a meeting point between East and West. A meeting point where a cooperation of the Eastern and Western economies can take place. Maybe two examples here. A very successful German-Chinese cooperation on the field of electromobility in Hungary. Or a successful Russian-German-French cooperation on the field of nuclear industry in Hungary. Are proofs to what extent the world could take benefits out of a civilized East-to-West cooperation. If I want to summarize the approach of Hungary nowadays, how we address the major challenges of the world, I would do it in the following way. No war, no migration, no gender. Let me emphasize these three points. No war. Hungary stands up for peace. We are proud members of the pro-peace majority of this organization. And we do hope that this year's General Assembly will help us to find solutions to bring peace to parts of the world which are suffering from wars. And we do hope that this time, this hope of ours will not be transformed into an illusion at the end of this week. Hungary has been living for more than three and a half years now in the neighborhood of the war in Ukraine. We have been confronted with the consequences of this war on a daily basis. A huge wave of refugees, 1.3 million. Imagine, we are a country of less than 10 million inhabitants. The war inflation, skyrocketing energy prices, skyrocketing food prices. We do have to make daily efforts in order to be able to stay out of this war. Regardless all the efforts to drag us into this war and to provocate us into this war. It is the obligation and the duty of the Hungarian government to make sure that the security of the Hungarian people and Hungary itself is being guaranteed. Mr. President, since the outbreak of the war in Ukraine, Hungary has been standing up for ceasefire and peace talks. Unfortunately, we used to be under serious attacks, serious political attacks, accusations and stigmatization for this position of ours. Very rude accusation by those who are now speaking about the importance of ceasefire and peace talks by the same countries in Europe. And I have to tell you that if these countries, who used to stigmatize us for this position of ours, had not attacked us for this position, but had they argued in favor of ceasefire and peace talks from the very beginning, as we have been doing so, we could have saved lives of hundreds of thousands of people. And we could have avoided huge refugee waves. And we could have avoided, prevented a lot of destruction. But Europe, the European Union, has chosen a bad strategy, a failed strategy. Instead of isolating the war in Ukraine, this war has been globalized. The sanction packages the European Union has introduced have absolutely not fulfilled the expectations. They have caused more harms to the European economy than to the Russian one. And parallel to that, hundreds of billions of euros have been sent to Ukraine in the form of cash and weapons. Every day which goes on in this war brings forward the risk of escalation. All day spent in this war comes up with new casualties and destruction. And if we look at history, it's obvious that all wars end up around the negotiating table. There is no war which ends up in the battlefield. Therefore, may I express Hungary's respect towards President Trump and the efforts of President Trump. We do believe President Trump is the only hope to make peace in Ukraine. And we do hope that President Trump will not give up his efforts to make peace, regardless of the fact that many politicians in Europe rather undermine the efforts of President Trump than to support those. We Hungarians do have a very sad historic experience. This historic experience of ours says that in case there is a civilized east-to-west cooperation, the security situation of the world improves. But if there is a lack of civilized east-to-west cooperation, global security deteriorates. Therefore, we do hope that the high-level US-Russia contacts will be maintained. As long as high-level US-Russia contacts are on, we do have the hope that we can avoid the worst-case scenario. As long as the high-level US-Russia talks are on, we have a good hope to prevent escalation and to prevent the launch of World War III. So Hungary will continue to support all initiatives aiming at peace, and we will continue to support the peace efforts of President Trump, and we will continue to support the high-level US-Russia talks. And we make sure that Hungary is not going to be dragged into this war. We will stay out and protect the security of the Hungarian people. Second point, dear colleagues, no migration. Parallelly to the war in Ukraine, Europe has been faced with another tremendous security threat for the last 10 years, which is illegal migration. We Hungarians are in a special situation because of geography. We are at the European entrance of the busiest land route of migration to Europe. And we have a very sad experience here. We had been ran over by 400,000 illegal migrants 10 years ago. Aggressive people, marching through the country, rejecting any kind of cooperation with the local authorities, violating our border, occupying public areas, behaving in a way threatening the Hungarian people. What was our reaction? We have closed our border. We have built a fence, not a wall, but a fence. And we have put tremendous efforts in order to protect us from the illegal migrants. We have stopped one million illegal migrants at our southern border by building the fence there. We have spent multiple billions of dollars in order to be able to protect our border and our security. And guess what happens in Europe? The European Commission forces us to pay one million euro penalty on a daily basis because of protecting our border. One million euro penalty on a daily basis for the protection of our borders. This is insane. This is crazy. But I have to tell you that regardless of this penalty, we will protect our border. We'd rather pay one million euros per day, but we do not allow illegal migrants to come into Hungary. We protect ourselves. May I say, this is the best investment into our own security. And the pro-migration policy of the European Union comes forward with very sad impacts in the western part of Europe. Modern age anti-Semitism, parallel societies, gang wars and no-go zones. I want to make clear that regardless of all pressure from Brussels, Hungary will continue to protect the Hungarian people. We will protect ourselves, our culture, our way of life and our security. And we stick to our own sovereign right to make the decision who can enter the territory of Hungary. This decision must be made by us. And not by bureaucrats in Brussels. We have to consider the violation of border as it is. A crime. And those who commit this crime must be punished. International law speaks very clearly. If someone is being forced to leave her or his home, she or he is entitled to stay temporarily on the territory of the first safe country. But not the second, the third, the fourth or fifth. The first. And we are an example here. We are a neighboring country to Ukraine. So for those who have to escape from Ukraine because of the war, we are the first safe country. And we let all of them come in. All of them. But at our southern border, those who want to come in, those are illegal migrants. And none of them has been allowed and none of them will be allowed to enter the territory of our country. Thirdly, no gender. In Hungary, we do consider family as the basis of society. But we have to understand that there is a very aggressive, extreme liberal mainstream, which has been attacking family not only as an expression but as an institution as well. Therefore, I think it's appropriate to clarify what we Hungarians do mean under family. We do mean that family consists of a mother, a father and children. Where mother is a woman, father is a man. And a marriage can be made between one man and one woman. And in order to make sure, we have put all these into our constitution. And when it comes to our economic strategy, we do carry out a family-based economic strategy. Five percent of GDP we spend on supporting the families, which is far number one in the OECD area. And currently, a family-based tax revolution is going on in Hungary. Our basic principle is that if you decide to have a kid, that must not put you in a less advantageous position compared to if you do not have a kid. We do consider children as a blessing. Therefore, we do support the families to have as many kids as they wish to. From next year onwards, all mothers who have given birth to two children will enjoy lifelong exemption from paying personal income tax. And after the birth of each children, a certain part of the salary of the parents is exempted from taxation. And we will double this exemption from the beginning of next year. If the mother wishes to stay at home with the newborn kid for two and a half years, she receives 70 percent of her former salary. And all women spending 40 years at work can go to pension regardless of age. Young couples can take 28,000 euros of preferential loan called expecting babies, which means that in case of the birth of a first kid, interest rate is down to zero. After the birth of the second kid, 30 percent of the loan is being repaid by the state. And after the third kid being born, the state remits the whole loan. And as the most recent decision of the government, we launched the largest ever housing loan system in Hungary. All families are entitled to take a loan to buy a house or a flat with a fixed interest rate of 3 percent. So at the end, Mr. President, dear colleagues, it is our goal to make Hungary great again. In order to be able to make Hungary great again, we have to protect ourselves from the war, which has been going on for three and a half years in our neighborhood. In order to make Hungary great again, we have to protect ourselves from illegal migration, making sure that we do not allow any illegal migrants to the territory of Hungary. In order to make Hungary great again, we have to be able to protect ourselves from the aggressive gender propaganda, and we have to be able to strengthen our families. No war, no migration, no gender. This is the Hungarian recipe. Thank you so much for your kind attention.