Speaking ahead of the August 20 national holiday celebrating the founding of the Hungarian state, Kövér said Hungary had inherited from King St. Stephen “a stable state that is capable of reinventing itself and which has provided a framework for our lives and protected our national existence for over a millennium”. He said Hungary was one of four European Union member states that have stood for over a thousand years with the same name and in the same territory where they were originally founded. Kövér said that over the course of its history, others had always attempted to push Hungary “into one camp or another”. “It’s clear that in Europe today they’re trying to suck every sovereign state into a united states of Europe,” he said. Kövér said the 21st century could be won by making up for the lives lost in the wars and dictatorships of the 20th century. Hungary, he said, had to stay on the path it had been on between 2012 and 2022 which had been “characterised by continuous economic growth, rising employment, a rising birth rate and cultural prosperity”.