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Outrageous: Slovakia criminalises questioning of Beneš decrees, i.e. WWII-era collective punishment of Hungarians
Slovak President Peter Pellegrini has signed a highly controversial amendment to the country’s Criminal Code that makes it a criminal offence to publicly question the post–Second World War Beneš decrees, a move that has sparked fierce criticism from Hungarian minority groups, opposition parties and political figures in both Slovakia and Hungary.
The amendment, approved by the Slovak parliament earlier this month and signed into law on Tuesday, was originally intended to tighten penalties for minor theft. However, during parliamentary committee debates, the bill was significantly expanded to include several new provisions. According to Telex, these include criminalising alleged foreign interference in election campaigns, restricting the use of testimony from cooperating suspects—often referred to as “repentant witnesses”—and introducing penalties for publicly denying or questioning the legal framework established by post-war settlement documents, widely understood to refer to the Beneš decrees.
President Pellegrini confirmed that he chose not to veto or return the legislation for reconsideration, despite earlier indications that he might do so. “I decided not to send the amendment back to parliament for further debate and not to exercise my veto, but to sign it in the form approved by the legislature,” he said, adding that responsibility for the law lies with the government and the parliamentary majority that passed it.
Focus on the Beneš decrees
The most contentious element of the amendment is the provision that makes questioning the Beneš decrees a punishable offence. The decrees, issued in 1945 by then-Czechoslovak president Edvard Beneš, laid the legal foundation for the confiscation of property and the collective punishment of ethnic Germans and Hungarians following the Second World War. While Slovak authorities often argue that the decrees are no longer in force, they continue to be cited in certain property confiscation cases, particularly involving agricultural land and forests.
Under the new rules, publicly denying or challenging the legitimacy of the post-war settlement could result in criminal prosecution, with reports suggesting penalties of up to six months in prison.
Critics argue that the provision effectively stifles historical debate and disproportionately affects the Hungarian minority in Slovakia, many of whom continue to face unresolved property disputes linked to the decrees.
Hungarian minority reacts
The Hungarian minority party in Slovakia, the Hungarian Alliance (Magyar Szövetség), has been one of the most vocal opponents of the amendment. The party has repeatedly condemned the law and recently organised a protest march under the slogan “March of Innocence” to highlight what it sees as ongoing injustice and discrimination.
Following President Pellegrini’s decision to sign the law, his adviser on minority affairs, Krisztián Forró, resigned from his post. Forró, a former leader of the Hungarian Alliance, had previously stated that he would step down if the amendment became law. Explaining his decision, he said that public service is only acceptable to him if it remains consistent with his principles, including legal certainty, mutual respect and the dignity of the community he represents.
President Pellegrini has defended the amendment, arguing that the issue was reignited by an opposition party and has contributed to rising tensions between Slovaks and Hungarians. He insisted that the law does not affect the right of individuals to defend their property in court and stressed that legal remedies remain available in confiscation cases. At the same time, he said that attempts to question historical events in a way that fuels social tensions should be rejected.
Political backlash at home and abroad
The amendment has also drawn criticism from Slovakia’s liberal and progressive opposition parties, though largely for other reasons. Parties such as Freedom and Solidarity (SaS) and Progressive Slovakia have announced plans to challenge the law at the Constitutional Court, focusing primarily on changes affecting cooperating witnesses rather than the Beneš decrees provision.
In Hungary, the issue has prompted political reactions across the spectrum. Prime Minister Viktor Orbán previously said that “clarifying talks” were underway with the Slovak government to better understand the implications of the law, adding that further steps would depend on the outcome of those discussions.
Hungarian opposition figure Péter Magyar, leader of the Tisza Party, accused the Hungarian government of abandoning ethnic Hungarians abroad. In a social media post, he claimed that while Orbán presents himself as a patriot, he has failed to protect Hungarian communities in Slovakia, following what Magyar described as a similar failure regarding Hungarians in Transylvania.
Within Hungary’s governing parties, one of the strongest reactions came from Zsolt Németh, chairman of the Hungarian parliament’s foreign affairs committee. He described Slovakia’s approach as unacceptable and expressed solidarity with the Hungarian Alliance, arguing that confiscations based on the Beneš decrees amount to ethnic discrimination incompatible with 21st-century European values.
A sensitive legacy
The Beneš decrees remain one of the most sensitive historical issues in Central Europe, particularly in relations between Slovakia and Hungary. President Pellegrini’s decision to sign the amendment has ensured that the debate is far from over, with legal challenges, diplomatic discussions and minority protests all expected to continue in the coming months.
Slovakia First? For context, the Beneš Decrees are the post‑WWII Czechoslovak decrees used to justify the expulsion and expropriation of Germans and, to a lesser extent, Hungarians.
Mr. Fico and, now clearly also Mr. Pellegrini treat the decrees as a settled cornerstone of postwar justice and Slovak statehood, resisting Hungarian calls to revisit or morally reassess them.
Politically, defending the Beneš Decrees reinforces a narrative of Slovaks as historically wronged and now needing to protect their sovereignty and interests—whether against “Brussels,” Hungary, or pressures related to the Ukraine war.
Unfortunately, Dear Norbert, neighbouring tribes of people never like each other.
In the South we refer to this situation as ‘The Hatfields and the McKoys’ – two Kentucky families who, just as if they were in the olde country, started a feud and could never stop.
Let me be more clear: a hard “Hungary first” line almost automatically poisons relations with Slovakia.
The moment our Politicians ramp up the usual talk about “protecting Hungarians beyond the borders!”, “Trianon!”, or “historic Hungarian lands!”, Slovaks hear territorial revisionism and interference.
The result: recurring flare‑ups, frozen trust, and both governments playing the nationalist card at home instead of cooperating on borders, economy, and minority protection, where we actually have overlapping interests.
In the south Mouton you referred to as a “PRETEND AMERICAN” who can’t spell “McCoy” but betrayed his identity by using a European “K” instead.
You slipped up Mouton. We know exactly what you are and you are definitely not American but are someone putting out a constant stream of Kremlin inspired propaganda.
Mouton do you spell CAT with a K as in KAT. Why continue the pretending and just be yourself and post as IVAN or whatever your name is. I can even help you learn how to be and even better pretend American. Ha! Ha! Ha! You scumbag.
If they can do that with the Benes Decrees why not do it with Trianon as well forbidding any questioning of that treaty. Tilos! Orban where are you and your big mouth now? Silent are you? Of course because Fico is your friend in your alliance with Russia.
Yes, of course, Orbán Viktor is silent, because he is a rational man who understands that, for friendship to survive, you avoid the negativities that others prefer to carry on with.
The Fico/ Orbán friendship is a very positive thing for Europe.
At every step, Orbán tries to foster friendship and peace with other countries – and you seem not to like that, no, not one bit.
Fortunately you are not prime minister, for you would have a war going between Slovakia and Hungary lickety split.
No, wait! – you could not do that because you would already have sent all able-bodied Hungarian men to hunt Putin in the Donbass!!!!!
Here is PRETEND AMERICAN Mouton who says he is from the US south but puts out Russian propaganda. Obviously never trust anything someone says if they are deceiving you about their identity. I’m going to be on your ass IVAN every time you post.
I’d stop that rethoric if I were you.
You are boosting Mi Hazánk popularity, which is actively hostile to the West.
If you manged to reduce Fidesz support, but increased MH support, and you forced Orbán to collaborate with Toroczkai, you can say goodbye to the EU, NATO, and Ukraine.
Because Orbán actively tries to preserve these. Toroczkai openly plans to dismantle them. And he will cooperate with Russia to partition Ukraine or Romania for example.
If you fan anti Slovak sentiment in Hungary, the result could be a shitfest from Vien to Istanbul, to the point that the Geneva Convention will be called Geneva Suggestion afterwards.
Thank you, Márk, for your thoughtful and civil comment.
I am not at this site increasing or decreasing anyone’s support.
I am here as a private citizen of a country far away from Hungary -looking on with fascination and exchanging views.
As I have said, if I were Hungarian I would be in Mi Hazank. I agree with everything I have ever heard them voice.
I agree with you that Mi Hazank is anti-Western, if, by ‘being Western’, you mean that The West ought replace native Whites with non-native non-Whites, not to mentionsexualize elementary age schoolchildren, and promote homosexuality, anti-nationalism, and dope-smoking as basises for making excellent people, and, therefore, nations.
This is certainly the West that Bruxelles’ wants, which, to my view, and that of Mi Hazank, is profoundly anti-Western, anti-White Gentile, anti Christian, anti-Man, anti-Woman, and anti- anything that Europe, until just the last few years, has ever embraced.
I respectfully disagree with you that Orban Viktor is trying to preserve the EU.
What he is doing is trying to preserve Hungary by manouevering within the EU in the ways he feels are advantageous to Hungary.
Orbán would like to restructure the EU – for the same reasons that Toroczkai László wishes to do so, and I have heard both of them speak on this matter many times, since I began my Hungarian studies, which was around the time László formed Mi Hazank.
I do, however, agree with you that Mi Hazank is openly interested in restructuring the EU, along the lines that European culture has, until the last decade or two, always embraced.
Lastly, in my view, Hungary is headed for the following election result – Tisza – 36 … Mi Hazank 7 … Kétfarkú Kutya Párt 6 … Momentum 2 … DK 4 … Fidesz 45.
What would this result mean?
Mi Hazank will continue to grow it’s power over Rural Hungary, while Orbán Viktor will continue piloting Hungary on the same course.
Mouton is outed as a PRETEND AMERICAN pushing a Russian agenda. You can’t trust anything someone says when they deceive you about their identity. He claims to be from the US south but makes a spelling mistake substituting a K for a C on a famous name that no American would make but a European and particularly a Russian would. Go away scumbag Mouton.
So you say you are not Hungarian but you have made insightful comments about Russian culture that very few Americans would know unless they were of Russian origin or were possibly in academia studying Russia. Scumbag Russian.
You invoke a cartoon version of “the West” just to knock it down. Pretending that Western values are white replacement, sexualizing kids, promoting drugs, and destroying nations. That’s not serious analysis, I will call it out as a straw man designed to inflame, not inform. Real debates in Western societies about immigration, LGBTQ rights, education, or drug policy are complex and contested, not some unified project of moral decay, if you don’t mind!
You also lean heavily on racially charged and conspiratorial language like “native Whites” and “replacement,” – both straight out of extremist rhetoric. And bundling homosexuality, anti-nationalism, and “dope-smoking” together as if they’re a single evil agenda is just culture-war sloganeering.
If you have a case to make against Western policies, please make it with facts and arguments instead of fearmongering caricatures @mouton