The government is “generous” and will be willing to hold consultations, “even with those that do not want to abide by the law,” Lázár said.

The government will meet its obligation to also hold consultations with the European Commission on the matter, he added. Ever since 2010, every procedure against Hungary has been mounted after people reported against Hungary, and there has been a continuous flow of such reports from Hungarian left-wing parties, he insisted.

“Paid employees of Soros helped in the wording of the EP resolution,” he said, adding that Soros “has as many employees in Brussels as a state has.” They manufactured the various items in the proposal and carried out enormous lobbying activities, he said.

Soros has a huge influence on the European left and in European left wing parties, he added. The resolution is a political declaration, he said. It is unprecedented that “a vendetta is being carried out against Hungary” because the country refuses to let migrants settle, open its borders and give up its controls, Lázár said, calling the EP resolution an attempt, not for the first time, to put Hungary under pressure.

Commenting on the fact that even some European People’s Party MEPs voted in support of the resolution, he said the EPP included many different types of person and some had leftwing leanings. There is no EP group or commission leader left who has not been contacted by Soros’s people in the recent past, he added.

The main issue of the next few years will be whether Hungary can maintain its independence as a member state of the European Union, Lázár said. Serious disputes can be expected on relatively simple questions, such as who should decide whom to allow into Hungary.

Voters think this decision should be kept in the hands of Hungarians, he added. Another serious dispute revolves around who sets tax rates: Brussels or the Hungarian parliament elected by taxpayers, Lázár said. The supporters of internationalism in Europe want to curb the powers of nation states and boost the powers of Brussels, he added.

He also said that Hungary’s border seal was working well and there had been a “spectacular drop” in the number of those attempting to cross illegally. He denied reports that the fence has been electrified. Its alarm system poses no danger to human life, he said.

Commenting on Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s recent visit in China, he said the visit was a new stage in Hungary’s interest representation. Citing Orbán, he said globalisation was undergoing change and the East and West were coming into balance.

Currently not only the West has capital, technology, development and economic power but also the East. Among the deals signed, he highlighted the completion of talks on the Budapest-Belgrade railway line, saying the project could start soon and would produce a return on the investment for the Hungarian state.

Hungary wants to be a hub for central Europe, so it is planning fixedline developments in both freight and passenger transport to the north, the east and also to the south, he said.

Republished with permission of Hungary Matters, MTI’s daily newsletter.

MTI photo: Szigetváry Zsolt