Andrej Babiš discussed with British Prime Minister May, Estonian Prime Minister Ratas and Austrian Chancellor Kurz in Salzburg

On Friday 27 July 2018, Prime Minister Andrej Babiš visited Salzburg, where he attended the opening of this year's Salzburg Music Festival at the invitation of Chancellor Kurz. On this occasion, he also had a meeting with his host, Federal Chancellor Sebastian Kurz, as well as with other guests of the festival, Estonian Prime Minister Jüri Ratas and British Prime Minister Theresa May.

In addition to the opening ceremony by Austrian President Alexander Van der Bellen, Babiš also attended the premiere of rendition of The Magic Flute, where Czech opera singer Adam Plachetka performed in the Role of Papageno.

In the meeting with the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland Theresa May, the main topic was the procedure in the negotiations on the United Kingdom's withdrawal from the European Union. Prime Minister Andrej Babiš reiterated the Czech position in negotiations on Brexit, and he showed interest in completion of the Withdrawal Agreement. He emphasized that the priority of the Czech Republic is to preserve the indivisibility of freedoms of the internal market, protection of interests of Czech citizens and Czech companies, and to ensure security in Europe. He said that the recent publication of the White Paper on the future relationship between the United Kingdom and the EU was a good step towards a more specific stance.

“Brexit is not positive for Europe, but we must try to minimize the overall impacts. It is important for us to maintain relationships from the past with the United Kingdom. It has always been our ally, 50 thousand Czech citizens work there, it is important with regard to trade as well as NATO cooperation,“ Prime Minister Andrej Babiš said.

The main topics of the discussions with Austrian Federal Chancellor Sebastian Kurz were cooperation within the formats of regional Central European cooperation, especially in the context of the Slavkov Declaration, and European issues. These included mainly the issue of migration, the multiannual financial framework, and the conclusions of the June European Council. They also discussed transport infrastructure, namely the road Brno–Mikulov–Vienna and České Budějovice–Linz.

The discussion of Andrej Babiš with Estonian Prime Minister Jüri Ratas covered mostly European topics, namely migration, use of the internal market, defence and security cooperation within the North Atlantic Alliance and other international issues.

On Wednesday, Prime Minister Andrej Babiš visited Bayreuth, Germany, and attended the opening of the Wagner Music Festival. Babiš discussed cooperation among border regions of the Czech Republic and the Free State of Bavaria with Bavarian Prime Minister Markus Söder. The topics also included continuation of the Czech-German strategic dialogue, economic cooperation, cooperation in the area of science and research, and police cooperation in combating cross-border crime.