
EU affairs minister welcomes court decision on releasing EC-Pfizer text messages
The EU court has made such a significant decision that "it is visible even from the Moon," Minister Bóka said on Facebook.
János Bóka, Hungary's EU affairs minister, has welcomed a ruling passed by the EU court, according to which the European Commission should have made public the text messages it had exchanged with Covid vaccine supplier Pfizer during the pandemic.
The EU court has made such a significant decision that 'it is visible even from the Moon,' Minister Bóka said on Facebook.
'The Commission has until now stated that those messages did not even exist', the minister said. 'But as it now turns out, they in fact did, and the EC should release those,' he added.
'We, however, still don't know what those messages contain. We don't know what happened around placing an order for the purchase of 1.8 billion doses of vaccines and the payment of several tens of billions of euros,' said Minister Bóka.

Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles


Budapest Times
3 hours ago
- Budapest Times
Foreign Minister discusses developments in Middle East with Israeli counterpart
Péter Szijjártó, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade, has discussed developments in the Middle East with Gideon Saar, his Israeli counterpart, by phone. 'I confirmed Hungary's firm support for stability in the region as well as our commitment to further strengthening our strategic alliance with Israel,' the foreign minister said in a post on Facebook on Sunday. 'We are very concerned with the surge of modern anti-Semitism in the Western part of Europe, and the increasingly anti-Israel rhetoric of some Western European politicians,' he added. 'Once more I assured my colleague that Hungary would reject any endeavour aimed at weakening ties between Europe and Israel; accordingly, we do not support a review of the EU-Israel Association Agreement, either,' Minister Szijjártó said.


Budapest Times
3 hours ago
- Budapest Times
Nagy: Hungary will maintain its ban on imports of Ukrainian food products
István Nagy, Minister of Agriculture, said the interests of Hungarian farmers come first, therefore, Hungary will maintain its ban on imports of Ukrainian food products after the expiry of the free trade agreement between Brussels and Kyiv. Commenting on his social media page, Minister Nagy noted that after the outbreak of the war in Ukraine, Brussels decided to allow unlimited and duty-free entry of Ukrainian produce into the territory of the European Union. As a result, large quantities of Ukrainian grain and other farm products of dubious quality have flowed into EU territory without control, jeopardising the livelihood of Hungarian farmers. In order to protect the interests of Hungarian farmers, Hungary introduced a ban on imports of these products. Minister Nagy said the unlimited and unilateral EU authorisation of Ukrainian imports expired on June 5, and after that, the pre-war trade agreement between Ukraine and the EU temporarily came into force. According to this, Ukraine can import farm products into the EU duty-free according to specified quotas. Despite the reduction in import volume, there is still no guarantee that imports arriving in the EU will not be stuck in member states near the border, causing huge market disruptions again, the minister said. Another problem is that the regulation still does not provide a solution for corn, one of the most sensitive products from the Hungarian point of view, given that the tariff rate is zero. In addition, even the reduced quotas would give Ukrainian farmers an excessive competitive advantage to the detriment of Hungarian producers, primarily in the case of meat and eggs. In this situation, Hungary continues to maintain the import ban introduced under national jurisdiction two years ago to protect the interests of Hungarian farmers, Nagy said. Minister Nagy said Hungary continues to stand by the principle that food arriving in the EU must comply with the same rules and traceability criteria as products made in the EU. Ukraine must not endanger the EU's agricultural markets, for which Brussels must find a long-term and reassuring solution. Until this happens, Hungary will maintain the restrictive measures, Minister Nagy said.


Budapest Times
a day ago
- Budapest Times
Orbán: Brussels and Ukraine are assembling a puppet government
Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said in an interview with public radio on Friday that Brussels and Ukraine are assembling a puppet government with the aim of changing Hungary's policy on Ukraine after the elections. PM Orbán said 'they went looking for a prime minister candidate, a party leader and now a defense minister.' 'We should have no doubt that we are facing another political concept and strategy, another future for Hungary. A pro-Brussels puppet government would mean that the government is pro-Ukraine and the defense minister is pro-war. Even Hungarian parties do little to disguise that. The Tisza and the [Democratic Coalition] are essentially openly pro-Ukraine political organisations,' he said. Commenting on an upcoming EU summit, PM Orbán said the 'only topic in Brussels is Ukraine's EU accession. This is the number one issue of international politics in Brussels now, not tomorrow or the day after, but here and now.' 'They think in Brussels that Europe is at war, that Ukraine is its vanguard fighting our war.'