Slovakia
The Slovak Republic and the Czech Republic went their separate ways after 1 January 1993, an event sometimes called the Velvet Divorce. Slovakia has remained a close partner with the Czech Republic. Both countries co-operate with Hungary and Poland in the Visegrád Group. Slovakia became a member of NATO on 29 March 2004 and of the European Union on 1 May 2004. On 1 January 2009, Slovakia adopted the Euro as its national currency.
Hungary–Slovakia relations
After the first break-up of Czechoslovakia in March 1939, Hungary was the first state which officially recognized the independent Slovakia. Subsequently, Hungary and Slovakia established embassies in Bratislava and Budapest and kept diplomatic relations during the World War Two. Despite a formal alliance inside the Berlin pact (1940) and a common war against the Anti-Hitler coalition, Slovak-Hungarian political relations maintained on the brink of war due to the frontier dispute and the oppression of Slovak minority in Hungary and Hungarian minority in Slovakia. The restoration of Czechoslovakia and the liquidation of the independent Slovakia in 1945 led to the end of the first period of Hungary-Slovakia's relations.