Hungarian president signs the criticized civil organisations law

President Janos Ader signed Hungary’s new law concerning transparency of civil organisations receiving foreign support, on Friday.

“I cannot see any legal or constitutional concerns that should hinder publication of the law,” the president said, adding that the law would not affect the operations of the organisations it is to govern.

In a statement, the president referred to civil organisations as “indispensable and respectable” players of a democracy and noted their activities ranging from promoting human rights through environmental protection to welfare services. He said that Hungary had over 56,000 civil organisations and insisted that 99 percent of them would be left unaffected by the new legislation.

The new law will only stipulate further administrative tasks on organisations receiving over 7.2 million forints (EUR 23,400) per year from abroad, while their earlier activities would be left unchanged, Áder said.

The civil organisations law was critized by US government, German foreign minister and many other civil organisations.