The European Parliament is threatening to revoke Hungary’s voting rights, with 120 MEPs petitioning for the launching of the next level Article 7 proceedings against Hungary ahead of a key EU summit in February.
According to press reports, Giorgia Meloni is in an endeavour to persuade Viktor Orbán to withdraw his veto on the €50 billion EU aid to Ukraine, offering a unique deal in return. Kyiv could soon face severe challenges or even collapse without substantial foreign financial assistance.
Miklós Szánthó announced that the conference will be taking place between 25–26 April, and the keynote speaker will be Prime Minister Viktor Orbán of Hungary.
Emmanuel Macron will preside over the national tribute ceremony for Jacques Delors at the courtyard of the Invalides Cathedral in Paris on Friday morning.
At the year-end press conference, PM Orbán explained why he chose to veto the €50 billion aid package to Ukraine at the recent EU Summit, how he views the potential Ukrainian and Swedish NATO accession, and what he believes the biggest struggles of 2023 were. He also talked about what hopes he has for the new year of 2024.
The Prime Minister said the EU was in the habit of making bad decisions, and he listed the 2008 financial crisis and migration as examples, as well as the decision regarding the war in Ukraine to go ‘towards war and sanctions’ rather than in the direction of peace.
Arriving for the two-day EU summit, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán stated that Hungary’s position is very clear. ‘When we talk about enlargement, the Hungarian stance states that it is a merit-based, sophisticated, legal procedure,’ he explained.
Prime Minister Viktor Orbán on Friday said it was a mistake for the European Commission to be pushing for EU leaders to put Ukraine’s European Union accession on the agenda, opining that the bloc should first sign a five to ten-year strategic partnership agreement with the country.
According to the Hungarian government, ‘preserving the ethnic foundations is our joint responsibility’, and as long as that exists, the politics based on ethnic groups also has a future, the Hungarian prime minister said.
According to the PM, while ‘lost sovereignty was in the focus of the last century’, Hungary regained its sovereignty at the end of the 20th century, so ‘this decade is about retaining that sovereignty’. The lesson that can be learned from the dissolution of the Socialist bloc and of the Soviet Union, Viktor Orbán suggested, is that ‘it is worth being radical, recalling the activism and courage of the system-changing Fidesz politicians.
Hungarian Conservative is a quarterly magazine on contemporary political, philosophical and cultural issues from a conservative perspective.