Hungary's Prime Minister Viktor Obran held a press conference on Tuesday, spoke about various topics covering economy, pandemic, migrations and EU energy crisis. He also touched upon the situation in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Orban, who announced a visit to Sarajevo for January 25 at invitation of the Chairman of Bosnia's Council of Ministers Zoran Tegeltija visited Bosnia and Herzegovina earlier this year but met only Milorad Dodik, the Serb member of Bosnia's tripartite Presidency.

Answering to the question about his “close ties” with Dodik, Orban said that Hungary's southern border is 70-80 kilometres away from the Bosnian border and that when Yugoslav war arrived “tens of thousands came through.”

“If a conflict develops there, it will also appear in Hungary the next morning,” he stressed, adding that the Serbian nation is crucial in the Balkans.

“The Balkans cannot be stabilised without the Serbs, without Bosnia, and Bosnia cannot be stabilised without the Bosnian Serbs. The key to the Balkans is the Serbian nation,” Orban underlined, according to the official report from the press conference.

The four-hour conference, which the PM Cabinet's international spokesman Zoltan Kovacs called a “marathon press conference,” also discussed the EU enlargement and Orban noted that “the stars are not aligned well” but also that they never were when it comes to the enlargement.

“The challenge with Bosnia is how to integrate a country with 2 million Muslims,” Orban emphasised and concluded:

“In any case, we will still be a gateway even if the western Member States of the EU do not yet want to include the countries of the Western Balkans.”

The challenge with Bosnia is how to integrate a country with 2 million muslims.

— Zoltan Kovacs (@zoltanspox) December 21, 2021