Knowing Who Your Friends Are

A foreign policy targeting relations with Hungary's neighbouring countries is not an entirely new concept, but late 2005 and early 2006 saw a new initiative: joint cabinet meetings with the country's neighbours Romania, Austria and Croatia. Certainly, this increased attention has a lot to do with Hungarian business and diaspora interests, but it also represents the country targeting its efforts in a way likely to gain it the approval of Brussels. In each case, bilateral discussions focused on two out of the seven priority issues of the current Presidency: strengthening the area of freedom, security and justice; and Union enlargement.

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