Commissioner Hahn in Budapest for the preparation of the Eastern Partnership Summit

Johannes Hahn, Commissioner for European Neighbourhood Policy and Enlargement Negotiations is in Budapest, Hungary, today to participate at the informal Eastern Partnership V4 ministerial meeting. The meeting is organised by the Visegrád Group and will focus on the preparation of the upcoming Eastern Partnership Summit (that will take place on 24 November in Brussels), as well as on stepping up cooperation on energy infrastructure, including energy efficiency. Commissioner met this morning with Ministers of Foreign Affairs of the Visegrád Group - Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia - and of the Eastern Partnership countries - Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, the Republic of Moldova and Ukraine.

Earlier this morning, Commissioner Johannes Hahn said: "The upcoming Summit will be an opportunity to build on our achievements and to inject new dynamism into our relations. Differentiation and ownership remain pivotal in our engagement. Following this approach we have achieved crucial results such as three Association Agreements including their Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Areas (DCFTA), the agreement we have negotiated with Armenia and the ongoing negotiations with Azerbaijan. Also, we are working full speed to implement and update the "20 deliverables for 2020", which results have an important impact on the life of the people. More must be done, our work and engagement has to continue and a non-confrontational nature of the Partnership is crucial for our joint success." The full speech is available online.