Peter Szijjarto told a press conference after a meeting of the Hungarian-Uzbek mixed committee that the church of the village had been set on fire and anti-Hungarian slogans had been sprayed on its walls.

"Such attacks against a national community in a country supposedly aspiring for European Union membership are outrageous, astounding and disappointing," Szijjarto said.

He insisted that anti-Hungarian attacks had started a decade ago "in the form of laws systemically curbing the community's rights to the use of their mothertongue."

"The Ukrainian state is responsible for that. We have been asking them to stop for ten years... We have indicated at all possible forums that Hungarians in Transcarpathia are suffering grave attacks. It started with laws and went on to forced conscription, assault and arson on churches," he said.

Szijjarto also condemned European political leaders who "turned away and refused to acknowledge that the Hungarian community is suffering harsh attacks combined with physical intimidation in Ukraine, a country which they are trying to fast-track into the EU."

He said he had given instructions to have the funding for the church's reconstruction transferred to the diocese still on Thursday.

President Sulyok: 'Transcarpathia not alone; Hungary stands up for Hungarians'

Transcarpathia is not alone, President Tamas Sulyok said on Thursday, emphasising that Hungary stands up for Hungarians.

"I am certain that every decent person is deeply outraged by the vile attack on the Greek Catholic church in Palagy Komarivci (Palagykomoroc) and the incitement against Hungarians, regardless of their nationality," the president said on Facebook.

Sulyok said such actions were "unacceptable" not only in Europe, but anywhere else in the world.
 

"I call on the Ukrainian authorities to do everything in their power to prevent a repeat of such actions," he said.

Sulyok asked ethnic Hungarians in Transcarpathia to "keep their faith and not to forget that they are not alone".

"Hungary will always stand by you," the president added.

Orban: Hungary won’t tolerate what’s being done to Transcarpathia Hungarians

"Forced conscription, murder, church arson, incitement and intimidation: this is all happening to Hungarians in Transcarpathia," Prime Minister Viktor Orban said on Facebook on Thursday.
 

Orban reacted to an arson attack on a church in Transcarpathia, which was also defaced with anti-Hungarian slogans.

"Forced conscription, murder, church arson, incitement and intimidation: this is all happening to our people, Hungarians, in Transcarpathia," Orban said. "We won’t allow it, you can count on us!"

Meanwhile, Szijjarto: Three Ukrainian leaders banned from Hungary

The government has banned three Ukrainian officials from Hungary, saying they were responsible for forced conscription in Ukraine, the foreign minister said on Thursday, adding that the ministry had earlier proposed that they are placed on a European Union sanctions list.
 

The ministry cited Peter Szijjarto as commenting on the case of Jozsef Sebestyen who had been recently beaten to death during forced conscription in Ukraine. Szijjarto told a press conference after a meeting of a Hungarian-Uzbek mixed committee that the Council of Europe had confirmed reports of physical violence and torture during conscription in Ukraine.

He said that since a Hungarian had fallen victim to this, the government on Wednesday proposed placing three persons on a sanctions list in Brussels. The officials in question are the chief of staff of the Ukrainian Ground Forces, the commander of the Western Operational Command and the head of the mobilization Directorate of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine.

"While this is being done, we arranged today that all three persons should be banned from Hungary," he said.

In response to a question, he said that freezing Hungary-Ukraine relations would bring great problems to Ukraine because Hungary was currently the largest electricity supplier of the neighbouring country and several hundred million cubic metres of natural gas arrived to Ukraine from Hungary.

He added that in such situations the international public and liberal politicians often tried to find scapegoats. "It was not us who took away the Ukrainian minority's rights in Hungary. It was not us who stopped oil transports last year. It is not in Hungary that Ukrainian temples are set to fire. And it was not a Ukrainian who died during conscription in Hungary".


Source: MTI – Hungary’s national news agency since 1881. While MTI articles are usually factual, some may contain political bias, and readers should be aware that such content does not reflect the position of XpatLoop, which is neutral and independent.

Since the goal of XpatLoop is to keep readers well briefed, right across the spectrum of opinions, MTI items are shared to ensure readers are aware of all narratives within the local media.

XpatLoop believes in empowering readers to form their own views through complete and comprehensive coverage. To facilitate this XpatLoop has a balanced range of news partners, as you can see when you surf around XpatLoop.com

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