Andrej Babis, ANO leader and likely next Czech prime minister, met with Polish President Karol Nawrocki in Prague yesterday to discuss the next European Council meeting and cooperation in the Visegrad Four (V4) group, which he wants to renew, Babis told CTK after the meeting.
The V4 consists of the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland and Hungary.
“We talked mainly about the upcoming European Council meeting, which is supposed to address the main issues,” Babis said. “Firstly, the relationship with Ukraine, the new budget, energy, other things.”
Babis and Nawrocki agreed that the V4 had good results in the past when it operated at the level of prime ministers. If Babis becomes Czech prime minister, he hopes to seek renewed cooperation on issues on which there is consensus.
“If some countries within the V4 have a different opinion on the conflict in Ukraine, it does not mean that we cannot jointly address ETS 2, illegal migration, revisit ETS 1 and, above all, energy and other issues that Europe is concerned about,” Babis noted.
V4 activity decreased during the outgoing government of Petr Fiala (ODS) due to the divergent views on foreign policy issues between the Czech Republic and Poland on one hand and Slovakia and Hungary on the other.
Nawrocki told a press conference with Czech President Petr Pavel, whom he met in the morning, that he believes the V4 is facing a pragmatic model of cooperation. He said the countries could cooperate, for example, on climate and migration issues or on the approach to the introduction of emission allowances for household heating and transport (ETS 2).
In a lecture at Charles University in the evening, Nawrocki mentioned the challenges currently facing Central European countries, Poland’s cooperation with neighbouring countries, and the possibilities of transforming the European Union.
“During the debate with the president, the students discussed how Poland can strengthen its role as a pillar of Europe against Russian imperialism and how common history influences today’s Polish-Ukrainian relations,” university spokesman Jan Bumba told CTK.
At the university, Nawrocki also met Rector Milena Kralickova, with whom he discussed the possibilities of further developing relations between Czech and Polish universities. Charles University currently has seven agreements with Polish universities and more than 100 students from Poland, Bumba said.
