President Hu Jintao boosts Chinese-Hungarian relations with visit to Budapest
Chinese President Hu Jintao paid a three-day official visit to Hungary this week. The president, who is also the general secretary of the Communist Party, will travel to Poland, Hungary, Romania and Uzbekistan. The last Chinese head of state to visit Hungary was Jiang Zemin in 1995.
Chinese-Hungarian relations have been experiencing a revival in recent years, and as the spokesman of the Hungarian Foreign Ministry, Tamás Tóth says, the current presidential visit is more than just a sign of that:
"This is the second ever visit abroad of the Chinese President and he will come to Hungary as part of a visit to four countries - Poland, Hungary, Romania, and then to Uzbekistan. Those are the four countries which have been chosen by the Chinese President. We do think that Hungary is among them due to the work that was begun about a year ago when Prime Minister Medgyessy decided to visit China after close to five decades of a lack of high-level bilateral visits from the Hungarian side."
China is a very important country not only for Hungary. It has become a more and more dominant actor on both the world economic and political scene. For that reason, having good relations with China is important for every country. In fact, Hungary did have good relations with China already in the previous political regime, the achievements of which should be preserved and developed, and it is an objective of the new Asian strategy of Hungarian foreign policy. The presidential visit fits into that framework, and both countries expect much from it.
"Hungary has a very pleasant situation. When we speak about economic relations, we are not only speaking about the exchange of goods and services but we can also speak about tourists going to the other country. In this respect, it is very important that Hungary is one of the first countries having a so-called 'approved destination states agreement' with China. During this visit, five bilateral economic memoranda or agreements will be signed among them. One of them is about the renewal of the air connection between Beijing and Budapest, which will not only help in the circulation of tourists but also of goods and services.
"China is a dynamic market and commercial relations between the two countries are also dynamic, though very unbalanced. Last year, for example, China's exports to Hungary totalled more than three billion US dollars, while Hungary's exports to China were a bit less than 200 million US dollars. So, this is unbalanced but the dynamic growth is important. In the first quarter of the present year, China's exports totalled around one billion US dollars, which represents a growth of 40% if we compare it to the result of the previous year. But Hungary's exports saw a growth of over 300%. So, those figures are very promising and we very much hope that the visit of the Chinese President will boost the economic relationship again."
To the question whether Hungary may become a bridge for China towards the European Union, the Hungarian foreign spokesman had this to say:
"One of the objectives of the Chinese part of this visit is to lay down the very basics of the relationship between Hungary as an EU member state and China. Hungary obviously and openly has become a more important country for China with the EU accession and if we consider that in Central Europe we have by far the largest Chinese community, with their help and fostered relations, there is a possibility of bridging between the rest of the European Union and China."
