Mezei István: Urban development in Slovakia (Pécs-Somorja, 2010)
6. Towns along the Hungarian and Slovak border
The organizational forms of cooperation international treaties ratified by the national parliaments. Nevertheless, the member states have to approve the participation of the future member in the grouping, as well as its competences and tasks. To interpret and implement an agreement regarding the establishment of a grouping, they should apply the law of the member state in which the headquarters of the grouping can be found, as specified in the agreement. The facts that the competences exercised by the grouping as an authority may not involve the competences of the police and its regulators, i.e. legislative competences, and that the grouping may not carry out tasks of justice and foreign affairs serve the maintenance of the sovereignty of the member states. The task of the grouping is to strengthen economic and social cohesion {Pintér 2007). The member states are obliged to take the necessary measures to enforce the decree and ensure its efficient adoption. The decree has been obligatory and has had to be enforced indirectly in all of the member states since 1st August 2007. Groupings can also be established without the preliminary adoption of national regulations. Hungary passed the law in June 2007 and Slovakia passed it in February 2008, however, Slovakia’s president did not sign it. The frames for cross-border development programmes as well as economic and social cooperation basically changed in 2008. On the one hand, by eliminating the Schengen internal borders, economic relations have been strengthening and new models of cooperation have emerged. On the other hand, based on the expectable influence of the decree regulating cooperation grouping and by the implementation of cross-border rural development programmes, there is a good chance of the integrated development of the small regions on both sides of the border. In accordance with the EGTC decree, the cooperating groups have to be able to implement the cooperation programmes co-financed by the EU (ERFA and Structural Funds) and the programmes initiated at a state or a regional/county/district level. In this respect, preparing microregional work organizations for management tasks is of utmost importance, because it is possible only in this way for them to implement regional cooperation and programmes meeting the actual demands of the cooperating settlements. The first grouping in Hungary was established on 27th January 2007 in Fehérgyarmat. The agreement on the Ung-Tisza-Túr European Grouping for Territorial Cooperation was signed by the mayors of the founding municipalities of the four countries (Hungary, Slovakia, Ukraine, Roma-165
