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Mideast peace, growth will stop migration to EU, Polish PM tells V4 summit

12.10.2021 20:45
Poland’s prime minister on Tuesday said his country and its regional partners wanted to see a peaceful and developing Middle East so that people did not have to migrate to Europe for economic and social reasons.
Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki speaks to reporters at a press conference in Budapest on Tuesday.
Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki speaks to reporters at a press conference in Budapest on Tuesday.Photo: EPA/Szilard Koszticsak

Mateusz Morawiecki made the statement as he attended a summit of leaders from Central Europe's Visegrad Group (V4) of countries, meeting together with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi in the Hungarian capital Budapest, Poland's PAP news agency reported. 

At a joint news conference, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban described Egypt as a key ally and partner for the European Union as the bloc faced a new migrant crisis, which he said was “much worse” than that afflicting Europe in 2015, the Polish state news agency reported.

Poland's Morawiecki was quoted as saying that “the whole Visegrad Group very much wants there to be peace in the Middle East, as well as the right conditions for economic and social development, which will prevent migration and terrorism."

Morawiecki added the V4 group would encourage western members of the EU to deepen their economic ties with Cairo, hailing Egypt as "a big partner with 100 million people and much promise for the future.”

He told reporters Poland was helping create a special economic zone in Egypt's Suez region, along the lines of a similar area around the southern Polish city of Katowice.

The four-nation Visegrad Group (V4) is a regional cooperation platform that brings together Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic and Slovakia.

The previous V4-Egypt summit took place in Budapest in July 2017.

(pm/gs)

Source: PAP