Hungary nominates EU representative

Hungary will nominate its ambassador to the European Union, Peter Balazs, to represent it on the European Commission after it joins the bloc in May, Prime Minister Peter Medgyessy said here Monday.

"This marks a new era," Medgyessy told a press briefing. "Until now things only happened to us but now we will have a voice in the affairs of the EU."

Balazs, a career diplomat, became Budapest's permanent representative to the EU in 2003, and before that served as state secretary for EU integration in the Hungarian foreign ministry.

Hungary is the seventh of the 10 countries due to join the EU on May 1 to designate its candidate for the European Commission.

All ten new EU member-states will be represented at the European Commission, which is the EU's executive.

Although they will have the right to vote, they will not have any specific portfolio contrary to the 20 current commissioners.

EC President Romano Prodi is trying to finalise a list of the future commissioners, which will have to be approved by the European Council and Parliament.

The new commissioners take up their posts on May 1, the day of the enlargement, for six months.

Hungarian Foreign Minister Laszlo Kovacs said Prodi has suggested that Balazs be assigned to work EU structural funding.