EC may assess whether Hungary has fulfilled commitments by April or May – Navracsics on Erasmus funds

"We're making pretty good progress, we are going step by step. The European Commission may assess whether Hungary has fulfilled its commitments in April-May."

- Tibor Navracsics, Minister of Regional Development, told Inforádió. If this happens, the situation with Erasmus could be resolved by the summer, Hungarian commercial channel ATV reports. Asked if this means that EU funds will arrive after the Commission's assessment in May, Navracsics said "let's assume that yes".

The minister negotiated with the European Commission on Wednesday on the conflict of interest rules related to university boards of trustees. According to the him, reaching an agreement with Brussels on the issue of university foundations is possible, but there is a great deal of mistrust because Brussels fears that politicians of governing parties sitting on universities' boards of trustees violates academic freedom.

On 9 January, it was revealed that educational institutions in Hungary that are run as foundations of public interest or maintained by such foundations will not be eligible for fresh EU funding. Minister at the Prime Minister's Office, Gergely Gulyás announced a month later, at a government briefing on 9 February, that ministers had resigned from their positions on university boards and that the same was expected of state secretaries, deputy state secretaries and government commissioners.

An agreement is also needed because on Sunday MEP István Ujhelyi, and later Hungarian daily Népszava and the portal Szabad Európa also wrote that the European Commission did not accept the government's proposals for the suspended Erasmus funds, which were formulated a few weeks ago.