Parliamentary Speaker Richard Raši (Hlas-SD) discussed bilateral cooperation and issues concerning the European Union with President of the Italian Chamber of Deputies Lorenzo Fontana during their meeting in Rome on Wednesday.
"We agreed that at a time in which Europe is losing ground as an economic power when compared with major global players, we must cooperate at the bilateral level as well and seek joint solutions to problems affecting both Italy and Slovakia," stated Raši at a briefing after the meeting.
He invited Fontana to visit Slovakia for talks in the Visegrad Group format (V4 - Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland), as Slovakia will take over the V4 presidency on 1 July. According to him, Fontana is very interested in the V4's activities.
"He said that he would come to Slovakia because the V4 and Italy, when taken together, represent 130 million people, and if we share the same common views and solutions to problems, it's going to be quite a force," stated Raši.
The politicians also addressed EU-related issues, including defence, energy and the automotive industry, as well as green policies. According to Raši, they agreed that environmental measures must be adopted with common sense.
"The result shouldn't be a green Europe that lacks jobs, with products imported from countries that have no emission criteria in place or face no restrictions on the European market," he said.
The talks also touched on the situation in Ukraine, while Raši pointed to Slovakia's and Italy's shared positions on the issue, stressing the need to achieve a peace agreement as soon as possible.
Source: TASR
