Ambassadors of the V4 states met with the leadership and students of UzhNU

Representatives of the diplomatic missions of the Visegrad Four states Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Hungary to Ukraine Ernő Keskeny, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Slovak Republic to Ukraine Juraj Siváček, Consul General of the Czech Republic in Lviv Pavel Pešek and Honorary Consul of the Czech Republic in Uzhhorod Otto Kovchar, Consul of the Consulate General of the Republic of Poland in Lviv Marian Orlikowski paid a working visit to Transcarpathia and Uzhhorod National University on October 7th 2017.

The high-ranking guests were met by the Rector of the UzhNU Professor Volodymyr Smolanka, Vice-rector for international relations Myroslava Lendel and the director of the Ukrainian-Hungarian Educational and Scientific Institute Oleksandr Shpenyk. They told the diplomats of the neighboring countries in detail about close long-term scientific and educational cooperation of one of the largest universities in Ukraine with its partner universities in the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary and Poland, about the opportunities of learning the languages of these countries created at UzhNU in the previous years, and about the academic mobility of students. They thanked the guests for the assistance in establishing bilateral ties. "We want to be good neighbours for our partners in your countries and believe that this cooperation will work for further integration and rapprochement of our peoples", - said Volodymyr Smolanka.

 Later, the diplomats met with lecturers and students of UzhNU. They mainly discussed the issues of the Central European political environment. Vice-rector Myroslava Lendel was interested in ambassadors' opinion on the possibility of expanding the format of cooperation within the framework of Vysehrad and transforming V4 into V5. Hungarian Ambassador to Ukraine Ernő Keskeny replied: "No expansion of the organization is currently planned, but it is very important for V4 to deepen the existing cooperation with all the countries in the areas where it has already been established. Therefore, there has been introduced "Visegrad+" formula, which allows us to cooperate with Ukraine; the work in the “Eastern Partnership” is also effective. In the long term, we hope for fruitful cooperation in a wide range of fields. Our countries have supported the granting of “visa-free regime” to Ukraine and are going to support you in your further European integration efforts."

The Ambassador of Slovakia to Ukraine Juraj Siváček added: "Austria and Slovenia intended to join the Visegrad four, but the Visegrad Four appeared when our countries were facing certain challenges which we successfully coped with. We’re not planning to change the number of member-states of the organization at the moment, but we are going to continue our collaboration with Ukraine, the Baltic countries, and other neighboring states, and share our experience with them."

 During the meeting, the representatives of the Visegrad Four also noted the positive transformations that took place in Ukraine after the Revolution of Dignity and expressed confidence that all disputes between countries should be resolved by means of a rational dialogue.

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