Kiev, Budapest agree to hold consultations to unblock Ukraine's EU accession talks - deputy PM

MOSCOW. April 30 (Interfax) - Ukraine and Hungary have agreed to launch regular consultations from May 12 to address Budapest's objections and unblock negotiations on Ukraine's accession to the European Union, Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister for European and Euro-Atlantic Integration and Justice Minister Olga Stefanishina said.

"We have agreed that, starting from May 12, the teams from Ukraine and Hungary that were present in Budapest today will work on a regular basis until we have a list of tasks as part of those 11 recommendations that are matter of concern for the Hungarian side," Ukrainian media quoted Stefanishina as saying in the national telethon on Tuesday following her visit to Budapest.

The Ukrainian delegation brought additional proposals for resolving all remaining issues to the Tuesday meeting, she said.

"We plan to work on the Hungarian side's counterproposals this week and expect to have interim results as soon as May 12 [...] I hope that this dialogue will have every chance to pave the way for unblocking the negotiation process," Stefanishina said.

This time, the Ukrainian side did not hear any radical or negative statements from Hungary, she said.

Stefanishina led the Ukrainian delegation to the talks in Budapest. The Hungarian delegation was headed by Deputy Minister and Parliamentary State Secretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade Levente Magyar.