Orbán in Italy: Christian democratic state has been built in Hungary

Hungary has in recent years postulated a political and state model: it has constructed a Christian democratic state, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said at a meeting of the national-conservative Brothers of Italy (FdI) party in Rome on Saturday.

This model works and is successful, Orbán said. The political success is obvious: Hungary’s governing alliance has won three parliamentary elections in a row with a two-thirds majority, and there have also been economic achievements, he added.

He said the model rests on three pillars: the family, the nation and Christian freedom. The base for this model is the new Christian constitution approved in 2011, he added.

Orbán said a family is a union between a man and a woman, adding that every child has the right to a father and a mother.

He acknowledged steps Hungary’s government has taken to support families, but said there are still too few children being born. If we don’t do something to counter the negative demographic trend, it will never change, he added.

Orbán said he could not support any policy that aims to replace the children who aren’t being born with migrants.

He said nations are supreme and cannot be forced under the laws of any kind of global government. That is an irreplaceable value which must be defended, he added.

Only we can say who can stay in the area of our state, he said. Everywhere else in the world, the nation is defended, but not in Europe, and that must be changed, he added.

Orbán explained Christian freedom as the right to defend one’s Christian way of life, adding that the new European Commission president wants to establish a new portfolio for the defence of the European way of life.

We are in the minority in the European political elite, but in the majority among nations and people, Orbán said. Our opposition is big, rich, strong and well organised, thus we must fight an unjustly difficult battle for what is right.

Hungary is prepared to help Italy, where it can; thus, if the country finally commits to protecting its borders, we will help to that end as well as to return migrants already in Italy back home, Orbán said.

In his remarks, Orbán responded to Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte, who said earlier at the event that the Visegrád Group – Hungary, the Czech Republic, Poland and Slovakia – had not assisted Italy in the area of migration policy.

Orbán said Hungary cannot help if Italy brings into its territory migrants from anywhere.

He said that a number of Western European leaders believe that allowing in masses of migrants who are different from the Christian majority will create a new society from the mix, a society that is of a higher quality. Central Europe does not think along these lines, because integration will not come of this: they will not live together, but apart, he added.