PHOTOS: Ferry service inaugurated on Hungary-Slovakia border

Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó on Thursday inaugurated a new ferry service between Neszmély in Hungary and Radvan (Dunaradvány) in Slovakia.

The HUF 2.2 billion (EUR 5.9 million) project was co-financed through European Union support, Szijjártó said at the inauguration. The service will have capacity to carry 80 pedestrian travellers or 40 pedestrians and 8 vehicles and will run 8 times a day on weekdays and 16 times a day on weekends, a ministry statement quoted Szijjártó as saying.

Having as many border crossing points as possible between Hungary and its neighbours is of strategic importance, Szijjártó said. Whereas in 2010 Hungary and Slovakia had just 22 border crossing points between them, they now have 36, owing to an agreement between Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and former Slovak premier Robert Fico, Szijjártó said.

“The opening of every such crossing point spares us an unworthy situation,” Szijjártó said, noting that the Slovak minister had to travel an hour by car from Radvan to get to a point which he could see from across the Danube.