Fidesz MEPs slam EU institutions for Balkans policy, COVID, journalists rights – UPDATED

Orbán’s ruling party, Fidesz, has 12 MEPs in Brussels. The party left the European People’s Party (EPP) in 2021 to avoid a possible exclusion. But their coalition partner, KDNP’s (Christian Democratic Party) MEP, György Hölvényi, remained among the ranks of the EPP. Anyway, Fidesz’s MEPs began a full-scale attack yesterday against several policies of the European Commission. The EP elections are approaching quickly, so the campaign already started.

Fidesz calls for more sensitive approach to Western Balkans

The European Union, in light of the current geopolitical situation, should apply a more sensitive approach to the complex problems of the Western Balkans, Kinga Gál, an MEP of ruling Fidesz, said in Strasbourg on Tuesday. Addressing a debate in an EP plenary session on the European Commission’s 2022 report on Bosnia and Herzegovina, Gál said the report was “unbalanced” and “intensified conflicts instead of easing tensions”. Hungary’s stance on Bosnia and Herzegovina demonstrates that dialogue based on mutual understanding is needed instead of “lecturing and threats of sanctions”, Gál said. She said this policy had been vindicated by the autonomous Serb Republic’s approval of two of the three so-called Berlin Process agreements following Hungary’s intercession.

Gál called it “unacceptable” that the EP’s “left-wing majority is advocating party interests when, for example, it criticises the presence of Hungarian companies, conflating them with Chinese companies from outside the EU”. She added that it was “unfair” that the report was being used to mount an ideologically based attack against the commissioner for enlargement. Gál urged meaningful support for Bosnia and Herzegovina, which she said would best be provided by speeding up the bloc’s enlargement.

Olivér Várhelyi, the European commissioner for neighbourhood and enlargement, said everything was in place for Bosnia and Herzegovina to begin to deliver on the key priorities needed for its EU accession. The EU believes in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Várhelyi said. Though further reforms are needed, there have been positive developments, such as the adoption of the state budget, the migration strategy and the counter-terrorism strategy, he said.

EU’s stronger protections against SLAPPs give journalists, rights activists ‘privileges’

Ernő Schaller-Baross, an MEP of ruling Fidesz, has said that a bill endorsed by the European Parliament on tightening the protection of journalists, human rights activists, researchers and artists against strategic lawsuits against public participation (SLAPPs) constituted “unprecedented privileges” for those actors. The Hungarian MEP issued a statement in reaction to a vote at an EP plenary session in Strasbourg on Tuesday which adopted a draft legislation on increased protection of those actors against SLAPPs, a particular form of harassment directed primarily against journalists and human rights defenders to prevent them from or penalise them for speaking up on issues of public interest.

The draft was adopted with 489 votes to 33 and 105 abstentions. In his statement, Schaller-Baross said the outcome of the vote clearly went to show that “the representatives of the European left exclude civil organisations, rights groups and human rights activists from the jurisdiction of a member states and grant them unprecedented privileges”. “Under the proposal drafted by Brussels, civil organisations will no longer be subject to law, so we have entered an era of NGOs boasting privileges,” the MEP said.

He said civil organisations “have earned their privileges” by citing their mission to represent the cause of open society, insisting however that those organisations had not received a mandate by voters for such a mission. “Any verdict delivered in that spirit can never be fair. A country where legislation and jurisdiction do not go together is not governed by the rule of law,” he said in the statement.

Fidesz MEP indicates ‘delay’ in Europe’s response to coronavirus pandemic

Edina Tóth, an MEP of ruling Fidesz, cited delays in Europe’s response to the coronavirus pandemic, saying that the bloc had been able to “overcome challenges” due to “quick decisions” by the individual member states, at an EP plenary session in Strasbourg on Tuesday. The Hungarian MEP gave an address at the session which discussed a report prepared by a special committee set up by the EP in March last year to assess the lessons learnt from the coronavirus pandemic and recommendations for the future. The committee’s mandate will run out on July 19.

Besides referring to delays in Europe’s response to the pandemic, Tóth said the report did not address “issues effecting European people the most” while “making exaggerated and erroneous statements” in connection with the EU’s performance. She said that a fact-finding report promised earlier about the issue of vaccine delivery contracts concluded via an exchange of text messages had not been prepared. “It would be time for a real investigation of the facts instead of attacking the member states,” said Tóth.

UPDATE: EU institutions attempting to cover up corruption cases

The proposal by European institutions to set up an ethics body is a way for them to attempt to cover up corruption cases, László Trócsányi, an MEP of Hungary’s ruling Fidesz, said in Strasbourg on Wednesday. The European Parliament is scheduled to vote during the day on the establishment of an independent ethics body in response to the corruption scandals uncovered within EU institutions, Trócsányi told Hungarian reporters. But the establishment of the body fails to address the fundamental problems, he said, arguing that the scandals in Brussels were criminal rather than ethics cases.

Trócsányi said the corruption cases that have plagued Brussels also affected member states. It should be the member states that decide how to proceed in such cases rather than “the Brussels bureaucracy regulating itself to cover up the cases”, he added. He criticised the EU’s response to the “systemic corruption” within the institutions as inadequate, saying that a real solution could not be reached without involving the member states.

Trócsányi said it was “unacceptable” that MEPs like Eva Kaili were allowed to vote on the establishment of the ethics body while still being under criminal investigation on suspicion of corruption.