Ruling Fidesz refused to attend a session of the national security committee on Tuesday convened by a Socialist lawmaker to investigate allegations that a minister had fallen for a financial scam.
The (Fidesz) deputy head of the committee, Szilárd Németh, cited security concerns posed by people associated with US financier George Soros as the reason for their boycott, and the meeting lacked a quorum.
Németh said the session had been called on the basis of “rumours and fake news” for election campaign purposes.
Referring to green opposition LMP representative Bernadett Szél and associated “national security risks”, he said that as long as “Soros’s people” were members of the committee, Fidesz would refuse to participate.
The operation of the “Soros network” is a growing national security problem in Hungary, he said. Németh said recent reports had suggested that representatives of the network had tried to convince foreign governments and German companies to boycott production in Hungary. This, he added, would threaten many Hungarian jobs.
Citing the press, Németh also insisted that the deputy head of Migration Aid had “admitted” that the NGO’s entire operation as a humanitarian organisation was a front for acquiring money and political power.
Molnár said they had wanted government members and the security services to provide information concerning reports that a private individual had commissioned Kósa to handle 1,300 billion forints (EUR 4.35bn) and he had suggested buying government bonds.
Opposition committee members waited for thirty minutes for the other members to show up. Since the meeting lacked a quorum, the representatives of the interior ministry and the security services refused to answer questions, saying they would only provide answers to written questions.
Molnár insisted the issue of Kósa’s alleged dealings was not a closed matter and he would attempt to call another meeting of the security committee before the April 8 parliamentary election.
According to press reports published last Tuesday, Kósa was entrusted with 4.35 billion euros by a private individual to buy government bonds. Citing a notarial deed, Magyar Nemzet said that the money was deposited into an FHB Bank account. The document dated Jan. 28, 2013 revealed that Kósa had signed a contract with the client to purchase government bonds and deposit them with the client’s investment account.
According to news portal Origo, a scam artist — whom the portal identified as Mrs. Gábor Szabó — had forged “at least thirty” documents similar to the one cited by Magyar Nemzet. Origo said the woman has a criminal record and the national police headquarters confirmed that she is currently under investigation for fraud.
Kósa has called the affair a “classic scam”. “I’ve never bought government securities for anyone and never accepted money from anyone,” Kósa said, asked to comment on the report at a recent news conference.
The Hungarian government will on Monday officially ask The Jerusalem Post for a copy of audio recordings “justifying efforts by a Soros NGO lobbying the German government to put pressure on Hungary”, the foreign minister said on Sunday, making reference to the newspaper’s recent article.
Péter Szijjártó responded to the Israeli paper saying on Friday that a Berlin-based NGO funded by US billionaire George Soros had tried to lobby the German government to intervene against Hungary’s law on the transparency of foreign-funded NGOs. The article made reference to audio recordings of a January meeting between Balázs Dénes, the Hungarian head of the Civil Liberties Union for Europe, and “someone he thought was a supporter”, in which Dénes can be heard talking about his organisation’s work to get Germany to pressure Hungary into overturning the law.
Szijjártó said the recordings indicated how the German government could put pressure through German businesses on the Hungarian government.
He in this context noted the presence of some 6,000 German companies employing currently about 300,000 people in Hungary.
German investments to Hungary account for 28-29 percent of all direct foreign investment to the country, Szijjártó said.
Any attempt aimed at leveraging German influence against Hungary will put at risk the jobs of hundreds of thousands of Hungarians, the foreign minister said.
Companies cited in the article include Mercedes, Audi and Bosch that employ some 35,000 Hungarians and talks are under way on prospective German investments that would create some 10,000 additional jobs, Szijjártó said, adding that “the Soros network’s activities jeopardise these”.
Having to accommodate migrants would “crush the country” financially, the prime minister told local television on Sunday.
In his interview, Viktor Orbán said that “we must speak openly” and insisted that “we either spend the money on developments or build a migrant haven”.
Orbán said he saw an “imminent danger” of Hungary being “turned into a destination for migrants”. He said the European Union was unfolding its plans under which Hungary would be obliged “to accommodate at least 10,000 migrants”.
He went on to say that the “empire” of US financier George Soros is working to make Europe a “continent for migrants” and will “attack everyone hindering those efforts; not only Hungary, but the Czech Republic and Slovakia, too”. “Some seek to flood Hungary with migrants, so that the country changes the same way as many western European cities have,” he added.
Orbán insisted that the yield of the national economy should be spent “on Hungarians, on Hungarian youth, pensioners, and Hungarian municipalities rather than migrants from other countries”. “Let us resist, let us protect Hungary and let there be a national government which will stand up for the country,” Orbán added referring to the upcoming parliamentary election.
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American financier George Soros and his organisations would do anything in their power to topple governments opposing migration, Viktor Orbán, Hungary’s prime minister, told public media on Friday, referring to the current home policy crisis in Slovakia.
The prime minister said he sees the “fingerprints of Soros and his organisations” on the recent events in Slovakia, and has no doubt that “Soros’s network makes every possible effort to topple anti-immigration governments.”
Slovakia’s present government resists migration and refuses to turn its country into a land of immigrants, Orbán said, adding that Soros’s organisations have attacked and would continue to attack the prime ministers of such governments “ruthlessly”.
The crisis started with the murder of Slovak investigative journalist Jan Kuciak and his girlfriend on February 25. Authorities say the murder was motivated by Kuciak’s work to uncover the Italian mafia’s connections in Slovakia. All top officials have condemned the act and pledged to conduct a full investigation.
Over the past few years Hungary and Slovakia have built strategic relations “advantageous to both countries’ citizens,” Orbán said. “We want to continue with that. Therefore, we need a stable Slovakia,” he said.
Migration will be the main topic of the April 8 parliamentary election and what’s at stake is whether Hungary becomes an “immigrant country” or it remains Hungarian, the government office chief told public Kossuth Radio on Sunday.
“Everybody must notice what’s at stake at the April ballot”, János Lázár said. The election will decide whether there will be “[a government formed by [US billionaire] George Soros or by Hungarian people who are against migration,” he said.
Lázár said that during the past eight years, despite the mistakes made, they worked for strengthening Hungary’s independence and now others want to weaken the country, the nation and the community “from the money of various powerful people”.
Lázár said politicians in Hungary are either pro-migration or anti-migration and he belongs to the latter group. He said that, if elected, he would fight for Hungary’s sovereignty and independence.
He said it was important for ruling Fidesz’s candidates during the upcoming weeks to convince people that they are able to defend the country. In these efforts, “they can cite the building of the border fence” which was not supported by any of the opposition parties, Lázár added.
What’s also at stake at the April election is whether those form a government who are able to develop the country by means of work and performance or “those who only talk about it”.
Opposition MPs and supporters have been submitting numerous complaints to the European Union because they hope that “people there who are against us or those that used to be employed by the Gyurcsány government and are now employed by the European Commission in Brussels” would initiate procedures against Hungary, Lázár said.
On the topic of corruption, he said that cities and countries that farewell, have money and demonstrate economic development will most probably have much less corruption than those lacking the money for pension increase and wage increase.
“It was clear between 2002 and 2010 that there was much corruption because the state treasury was empty, after all the money having been stolen,” Lázár said. “Currently there is money in the state treasury because we are not stealing. Simple as that,” he said.
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Never since the regime change has the state had as much as currently, with 3,000-4,000 billion forints (EUR 9.5bn-12.7bn) worth of state property repurchased since 2010, said Lázár.
Planned legislation dubbed “Stop Soros” which would introduce restrictions on NGOs involved with migrants is “problematic”, the Council of Europe’s Commissioner for Human Rights Nils Muiznieks said on Saturday.
The package of laws would impose arbitrary restrictions on NGOs, especially those working with migrants, Muiznieks told public news channel M1. He said this was problematic primarily because
the government’s migration policy foments intolerance and xenophobia in the public and the law would discourage NGOs from helping migrants.
Muiznieks said he did not consider it illegal to cross a border and seek protection, and instead of using the expression illegal migration he preferred uncontrolled migration.
The key issue regarding migration is whether people have the right to individually submit requests, get them assessed in a credible way and receive asylum or protected status if it is justified, Muiznieks said.
Every country has the right to protect its borders but every member of the CoE has signed the Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees which states that every request must be separately assessed and migrants must not be locked up, especially not if they are children and they are seeking help. In most cases, such people had been subjected to traumas and they must not be handled as criminals, he added.
The problem is that the Hungarian government handles every arrival as illegal, as if they were not in genuine need of help and as if they represented a threat to national security, Muiznieks said.
Yet, most of the people are escaping from terror or from a conflict and they are asking for help. Hungary must assess every case independently and only if someone is not in genuine need of protection, they can be sent back to their home country or to another safe country, he added.
Referring to US billionaire George Soros, he said a philanthropic person is being demonised in Hungary, which is rather disturbing and has an anti-Semitic touch. Soros has never done anything illegal, only helped people and NGOs throughout Europe, he added.
Hungary’s voters have two options, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said in an interview to local broadcaster Miskolc TV on Thursday. Either it can vote in a national government or Soros’s people will form one.
The recent elections in Europe and the upcoming Italian one revolves around a single issue, namely migration. This is also the case in Hungary, so this key issue “deserves thoughtful consideration”, he said.
He said migrants inevitably ended up in big cities like Miskolc and formed ghettos there, where no-go zones and parallel societies emerged with all the difficulties of coexistence that arise in such circumstances.
“You have to decide on something that is a one-way street; if you’re wrong, you can’t fix it…” he said
Referring to the recent by-election in the southern town of Hódmezővásárhely, where the combined opposition won in an upset for the ruling Fidesz party, the prime minister said there was no reason to be afraid but it was necessary to understand what the result signified. He said it was a “wake-up call”.
“For the sake of the future, we need to work together…” he said.
Political pacts had been concluded quietly in the background, he said. These would continue and the people party to them would promote Brussels’s policies based on the “Soros Plan”, he insisted.
“In the end, there are two options: a pro-immigration candidate or one opposed to it,” he added.
On the topic of the role of EU funds, Orbán said he always found it interesting “that when the country finally gets its act together, it turns out that it’s not thanks to the country’s efforts but down to EU funds.”
He said EU resources amounted 4 billion euros each year, while the country’s output was over 110 billion. The budget had been designed to take up EU funding and make the best use of it, the PM said.
Hungary’s progress “is due to the work of Hungarian people,” he said. “In the past 3.6 million had jobs and now 4.4 million work, and while there were 1.8 million taxpayers in the past now there are 4.4 million. This success belongs to us…” he said.
Orbán said the EU had no legal basis for linking funding to migrant quotas and the seven-year EU budget is adopted with a unanimous vote. He vowed to fight Brussels on this point.
The prime minister said he had visited the local football stadium, which he called the city’s heartland.
He noted the government’s Modern Cities investment scheme, saying this programme was the first he could recollect that focused on life in Hungary’s big rural cities. He added that in 2010 the city’s jobless rate had been stuck at 12 percent and now it was below 5 percent.
After the April 8 parliamentary elections, the new government will be formed either by current Prime Minister Viktor Orbán or the followers of billionaire George Soros, the government office chief said on Thursday.
At stake in the elections is “whether we can protect the country from migration” or not, János Lázár said at his regular press briefing.
The ruling alliance of Fidesz-KDNP has done everything it could in recent years to protect the country and represent the national interest by, for instance, building a fence on the border. The prime minister and Fidesz are protecting Hungarian sovereignty in the most credible way, he said.
Commenting on the recent victory of an independent candidate supported by the opposition parties at the local election in Hódmezővásárhely, he said the era of competing was over and an era of cooperation would follow.
The local Fidesz group is ready to participate in efforts to build the city, said Lázár, who is also an MP representing the region and a former mayor of the town near the southern border of Hungary.
In response to a question, he said he had never abandoned a fight and would continue his efforts to win voters’ confidence as an individual candidate in the general election. He said his message to opponents was: “There will be more János Lázár, not less.”
In response to a question querying whether he would change the ruling parties’ campaign communication in the light of the results in Hódmezővásárhely, he said he would not.
Commenting on public lighting projects recently reviewed by the European Commission and the European Anti-Fraud Office OLAF, he said the latter had completed its review and had sent its findings to the government and the public prosecutor’s office. The cabinet has responded to the comments and the development ministry’s managing body has refuted every item on the OLAF list, he said. The European Commission has not found Hungary at fault so far, he said, adding that Brussels will submit questions and Hungary will respond to them within the specified deadline.
the Hungarian government will not tolerate the intimidation of a single ethnic Hungarian in Transcarpathia.
He confirmed that the cabinet had decided to pay the cost of repairing the damage. He also said the government was concerned because this was the second serious attack against ethnic Hungarians in western Ukraine in the past month.
Commenting on the extreme cold weather, he said the utilisation of homeless shelters is at around 90 percent and Hungary’s gas reserves are sufficient even if the cold weather continues. There is around 2.3 billion cubic metres of natural gas in the reserves which is sufficient for up to 100 days.
In response to a question about plans to build a tennis stadium on Margaret Island, he said the government would not support building on the island based on the current plans, even if this meant not holding the world championships in 2019. The government will not allow Margaret Island “to be sacrificed”, he added.
At stake in the April election is whether the government is one that supports immigration, as the opposition would like, and implements the “Soros Plan”, or Fidesz remains in power, ensuring that the border fence stays and Hungary can continue to be a Hungarian country, the spokesman for Fidesz’s parliamentary group said on Sunday.
Speaking on public radio about the Friday summit of European Union leaders, János Halász said Hungary wants border protection to be the central issue for the EU, not mandatory resettlement.
There are some political parties in Hungary that would like to dismantle the border fence and ask why the country can’t take in some refugees, “who, together with their families would number in the tens of thousands or even 100,000”, he said. That would just be the first step; more would follow, he added.
There are certain western European politicians who do not honour European values, but want to implement the “Soros Plan”.
Obviously, migration is in the interest of certain people and groups, Halász said. These people have no concern that migration could destroy some European countries as well as Hungarian culture, he added.
“Soros organisations” give migrants a handbook to teach them how to “get around the law by lying”, instructing them to tell officials that they are under psychological pressure or that they are homosexuals or transsexuals because they can get refugee status more easily that way, he added.
The operating environment for civil organisations in Hungary has been made more complicated in recent years on the basis of a well-established scheme, a representative for the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNHCR) said on public television.
Birgit Van Hout, the OHCHR’s Regional Representative for Europe, said on news channel M1 that the government’s “Stop Soros” package of legislation was not the first such measure taken to restrict the opportunity for civil society to act.
The Hungarian government has the right to take steps to increase transparency, but these cannot make the operating environment so complicated that civil organisations are practically unable to operate or feel that they have been stigmatised, she added.
We believe the government’s “Stop Soros” package violates international laws on human rights because it is discriminatory and also from the point of view of access to funding, Van Hout said.
Governments have full freedom to control migration, but they must respect the ban on discrimination, and this package of legislation stigmatises organisations that deal with migrants and refugees, she added.
The OHCHR finds the taxation of funding concerning because access to this funding is an inseparable part of freedom of assembly, Van Hout said.
Anyone who criticises Hungary’s “Stop Soros” bill, which seeks to put restrictions on migration, questions its government’s power to take sovereign decisions, the foreign minister said on Tuesday.
It is clear that illegal migration works against Hungary’s interests and dismantling the fence along the country’s southern borders would work against the security interests of Hungarians, Péter Szijjártó told a press conference held in Budapest on another topic.
“So-called civil groups” promoting migration and open borders are against Hungary’s national security interests, he said.
It is the duty of the government to take measures, including legal ones, to prevent activities that compromise the country’s national security, he said.
This exchange concerns the dispute between two governments, which is normal on an issue such as migration, said Szijjártó. Luxembourg has a pro-migration government in place whereas Hungary has one opposing it, he said, adding that he expected the dispute to wear on for a long time.
Hungary is protecting European values, which includes maintaining the continent’s security, Szijjártó said, adding this goal is best served by protecting the borders and preventing the entry of illegal migrants.
Without the fence, not 400,000, but several million illegal migrants “would have trampled through” the country, he said.
Answering a question, Szijjártó said the Hungarian government is engaged “in an open dispute” with US billionaire George Soros along clear lines. “Soros doesn’t like Hungary being led by this government and he wants even more migrants to come to Europe, just as much as he wants open borders,” he said, adding that the Hungarian government’s position was just the opposite.
Featured image: www.facebook.com/MagyarországKormánya
Jean Asselborn, the foreign minister of Luxembourg, “hates Hungary”, the Hungarian foreign minister said on Monday.
In a statement, Péter Szijjártó called Asselborn a “pro-migration politician” and insisted that his counterpart was “playing the music of George Soros“. “They would flood Europe with migrants; they are extreme liberals with unacceptable views,” Szijjártó went on to say.
Earlier in the day, Asselborn voiced protest against the Hungarian government’s “Stop Soros” draft package in the online publication of Der Tagesspiegel, and called for activation of the EU Treaty’s Article 7 against the country.
Asselborn is “dull while Hungarians are not and they don’t need his nonsense to know what is good for them,” Szijjártó insisted.
“For us, Hungary comes first,” Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said in a keynote speech assessing his government’s performance since it entered power in 2010.
“The past eight years have been a success, and better than we expected”, Orbán said at the event held at Budapest’s Várkert Bazár on Sunday. “We are perhaps ahead of where we expected to be.” He added that his Fidesz government had promised to create 1 million jobs in 10 years, and by now 736,000 new jobs had been forged. The prime minister also made note of the agreement to raise wages and cut taxes.
Speaking ahead of the April general election, Orbán also noted that pensioners had received an extra payment at Christmas time.
“Taking into account the errors, too, I think the past eight years are not only presentable but we can be proud of many achievements,” Orbán said, adding that he wished Hungary another “eight years that are not worse”.
He said the country looked better than it did eight years ago but he added: “We have not yet finished our work; there’s still plenty left to do”.
Orbán insisted that the country was now performing better, but not yet as well as its talents would warrant.
Hungary, he said, was a place where “hard work is rewarded, a place where more people are in work, taking home more and keeping families across the country.”
“The Hungarian model is working,” Orbán insisted. Its success was due to “the millions of Hungarians who believe in it,” he added. “To honour work, support families, retain national identity, preserve independence; this is the future and this future can be ours.” He paid tribute to the 700,000 people who support their families, not through benefits, but through their own work. He also lauded Hungarian firms that create jobs and a new generation of young people who are forming families.
The prime minister said a key result of the past eight years was that financial vulnerability was now a thing of the past. “Families are no longer paying for the profits of multinationals through their household bills,” he said. Orbán also insisted that the era of energy dependence was also a thing of the past, given that soon natural gas would not only come from Russia but from Romania and Poland, too.
Orban noted that over 50 percent of the Hungarian banking sector was now “in the hands of the nation” and this was also true of the media. He added that there would be no national independence without a Hungarian banking system and media.
“We now have our independence,” he said, warning however that this independence would have to be protected “from time to time”.
“Don’t forget that the country’s fate should never be handed over to internationalists,” he said.
“We are not only a civic government but a government of the nation,” Orbán said. “The homeland comes before all else.”
“Our fame, renown and influence punches above the country’s size and economic weight,” he said.
The prime minister insisted that eight years of the Fidesz governing in alliance with the Christian Democrats had led to the end of “political correctness” in the country and “euro-blah-blah, prissy liberalism and politically correct hot air”. “We are sending the muzzle back to Brussels and the leash back to the IMF.”
“Here in Budapest, we say what we think and do as we say,” Orbán said, adding that this was a great luxury in today’s European political climate.
Addressing the 30 years of the Fidesz party, he emphasised the party’s “anti-communism and patriotism”.
Fidesz, he added, was different from the country’s other parties because “we love Hungary passionately and we would do anything for it.”
Orbán bemoaned what he insisted was the lamentable state of Hungary’s opposition parties. “Hungary deserves better,” he said. “It is no wonder there seems to be a general will to change the opposition rather than the government,” he said.
Migration
The prime minister warned that 60 million people, according to a NATO assessment, were poised to migrate to Europe by 2020. Most of the would-be migrants were from Muslim countries and they would form “a clear Muslim majority in Europe’s metropolises.”
“London won’t be the exception but the rule,” he added.
Speaking behind a lectern carrying the slogan “Hungary comes first”, the prime minister spoke about “the dispute between western and central Europe”, insisting that western Europe and become a zone of immigration and mixed populations, while central Europe was moving in the direction of a new future of development in various ways.
In the 50 minute speech, the prime minister spoke of Hungary’s role as a bastion against migration, praising the “exemplary performance of the Hungarian police force” and the double border fence which “has successfully protected the country’s southern border”.
Orbán: Christianity is Europe’s last hope
Orbán warned, however, of dangers coming from the west, saying politicians in Berlin, Brussels and Paris were “the source of that danger” because they pressured Hungary into adopting policies “that have turned their lands into immigrant countries and opened the door to the decline of Christianity and the spread of Islam.”
“It’s fashionable these days to say that Hungary should be similar to them out of solidarity … so let’s make it clear: Hungary stands in solidarity with those western Europeans and their leaders who want to save their countries and their Christian culture,” Orbán said.
“We think that Christianity is Europe’s last hope,” he said.
Orbán said the Visegrad Group was stable and that Austria had recently “turned towards patriotic, Christian policies”. He added that Germany’s CSU and Italy’s Forza Italia were symbols of “common sense and national and cultural confidence”. Meanwhile, he accused leftist politicians of trying and failing to do harm to Hungary. He listed former Austrian chancellors Werner Faymann and Christian Kern, former Italian PM Matteo Renzi and former Croatian PM Zoran Milanovic, as well as Germany’s Martin Schulz as examples of people who had attacked the Hungarian government but who had got nowhere.
Orbán: Stop Soros
The “antagonistic forces”, George Soros’s network and the bureaucrats “on his payroll” are far from giving up, he said. “Some still sniff the money; others don’t want to lose their positions or wages drawn from globalist elites.”
He insisted that the Council of Europe’s commissioner for human rights, Nils Muiznieks, “has let slip” that the “breeding of Soros-like humans” has secretly been in the making for years. “For them, we indigenous people with our own homelands, culture and religion . are a hopeless species, impervious to change,” he said. ”
If there is a need, we will introduce stronger and stronger weapons of the law” to combat the “Soros plan”, Orbán said.
The government would “not stand idly by while there are those who are crafting the implementation of the Soros Plan.”
Photo: MTI
The prime minister said the “Stop Soros” bill was the first step. Accordingly, he noted that anyone preoccupied with migration and migrants would have to apply for a national security licence to carry out their activities and the government would redirect a portion of foreign donations for “migrant-friendly NGOs” towards border protection. Further, the NGOs would have to be transparent about their finances and those “who fail to abort their dangerous plans will be banned, however powerful or rich they may be”.
“We will also fight in the international arena,” he said, adding that on Monday he will hand over to the holder of the rotating European Council presidency a European legislative proposal for ensuring the “airtight protection” of Europe’s borders. “The most important thing is protecting the borders and not the [EU] quota scheme. If we seal the borders, nobody can come in without permission and there will be no one to relocate,” Orbán said, adding that whoever “allows migrants into their country can keep them and take care of them”.
Orban also pledged to fight against the “Soros plan” in Brussels and the United Nations.
The UN “has got it in their heads” to complete an international compact on migration by the end of the year, Orban said. The document would say that migration “and organising migration” is beneficial to economic growth and welfare, he said.
“Soros and his network has nestled not only in Brussels and Budapest but also in New York, at the UN. They put enormous amounts of money into promoting migration on a global scale,” Orban said.
“We are not alone and we are going to fight to curb Soros’s plan, as presented in Brussels and at the UN, or to stop it if we can find allies. We have good a chance of doing so, and I think we will prevail in the end,” he said, concluding his speech with his customary slogan:
Fidesz will fight against any acceptance of the “United Nations’ migration package” and the government will not withdraw its “Stop Soros” bill, a spokesman for the ruling party told a news conference on Saturday.
Appearing in front of the Budapest headquarters of the UNHCR, Balázs Hidvéghi reacted to a statement made by the head of the headquarters, Rupert Coleville, on Friday. Coleville said that the bill named after US billionaire George Soros unjustifiably restricted freedom of association and represented a continuation of the Hungarian government’s “attack on human rights and the civil sphere”.
Hidvéghi said the UN migration package was reminiscent of well-known aspects of the “Soros Plan”.
Fidesz’s message to the UN is that “the Hungarian people reject the UN migration package as well as terrorism and the NGOs that organise migration,” he said, adding that “Fidesz stands by the Hungarian people”.
He insisted that the UN package reflected the thinking of Soros, namely that “migration is a good thing and every country should undertake a settlement programme with the involvement of NGOs”. “It is precisely this kind of crazy mindset that leads to the admittance — which has happened over the past few years — of several thousand potential terrorists into Europe,” he added.
The ruling Fidesz and Christian Democrat parties have voted unanimous support for the “Stop Soros” bill, Fidesz group leader Gergely Gulyás said after a joint recess of the two parties’ parliamentary groups in Visegrad in northern Hungary.
Parliamentary debate on the bill can start next week, with a decision expected after the April 8 election, Gulyás said.
The ruling parties do not command the votes to pass parts of the package requiring a two-third majority, Gulyás said. These are the passages affecting the law on national security, he said.
“International attacks” are also mounting against the legislation, he said, with the leftist opposition being mostly “pro-migration” and Jobbik “has flip-flopped” over the issue.
The ruling parties therefore “turn to the electorate”, and the parliament is to decide on the proposal after the election, he said.
Péter Harrach, group leader of the Christian Democrats, said that the coalition “faces the election with the calm of true achievements.” Their aim is to keep Hungary as safe as it is now, “as opposed to certain European cities,” he said.
Hungary will stay in the talks on the UN’s current migrant package and will make a push to influence the draft document in a meaningful way, the government office chief said on Thursday.
Péter Szijjártó, the foreign minister, has been given a mandate to propose amendments to the five areas the Hungarian government finds problematic and to enforce Hungary’s position in the document, János Lázár told a regular weekly press briefing.
Lázár rejected the UN’s position that migration has a positive effect on the economy and that it is a useful, favourable and unstoppable process. The government office chief voiced criticism over the draft document not distinguishing between political, economic, legal and illegal migrants.
He also voiced opposition to proposals under which “economic migrants should be ensured safe and regulated routes” and
criticised the UN for suggesting that “accommodation and jobs should be granted to each immigrant”.
Plans to “remove legal or physical barriers and open up borders” cannot be accepted, Lázár said. He went on to say that “making migration organised, continuous, and legitimate” is against Hungary’s interests. “That would be equal to extending an invitation to 60 million people in Africa, who would then be entitled to social benefits and jobs,” he argued.
Lázár said that there were “a dozen” European Union member states that did not accept the UN’s package, and suggested that Hungary could find several allies both within and outside the community to support its position.
On the subject of the government’s “Stop Soros” draft law Lázár said that the government had received feedback from some 900 voters during recent consultations, and “all of them called for tighter regulations or urged that George Soros should be banned from the country”. He added, however, that the latter proposition is not possible under the constitution “nor does the government plan to do so”.
Lázár said that the draft package, submitted to parliament on Wednesday, was aimed at “eliminating physical or legal loopholes, thwarting any organisation promoting migration”.
He noted that some components of the package required a two-thirds majority to pass, and voiced hope that parliament’s parties would support them.
“If not now, there will be an opportunity to pass the legislation after April 8,” he said referring to the upcoming election.
Lázár also suggested that the EU could launch an infringement procedure after the Soros laws are passed, but added that the Hungarian government “cannot be stopped”.
Responding to concerns raised by Council of Europe Commissioner Nils Muiznieks, Lázár said that the new laws would apply to organisations promoting illegal or economic migration, thus abusing international rules, rather than to ones assisting political refugees.
The group leader of ruling Fidesz said on Thursday that “a confidante” of US billionaire George Soros “has mounted an attack” against the Hungarian government’s new migration-related bill.
János Halász responded to Council of Europe’s human rights commissioner Nils Muiznieks stating concern about the just submitted “Stop Soros” bill that covers the conditions by which migration support organisations may operate and a tax on donations made to those NGOs among other measures.
In his statement Muiznieks said that, if passed by parliament, the regulations will introduce “further arbitrary restrictions to the indispensable work of human rights NGOs and defenders in Hungary”.
He stated concern that civil organisations failing to meet requirements set in the law could be subject to sanctions, including a fine and ultimately dissolution.
The commissioner raised further concern over the proposal posing a risk that “arbitrary restrictions may be applied on the freedom of movement of persons involved in refugee assistance at the border”.
“These proposed measures raise particular concerns because of the likelihood that they will be applied to organisations and individuals who carry out activities in the field of protecting the human rights of immigrants, asylum seekers and refugees that should be fully legitimate in a democratic society,” he said.
Muiznieks also expressed concern over the Hungarian government’s portrayal of migrants and migrant support NGOs as “a national security threat” calling on the government to refrain from penalising, stigmatising and restricting the work of these NGO-s and human rights defenders.
Halász said the commissioner has attacked the bill because it could effectively halt migration, which works against the so-called Soros Plan aimed at settling millions of migrants from Africa and the Middle East in Europe including Hungary.
The Hungarian government will not allow that, he said.
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Foreign economic and political interest groups led by [US billionaire George] Soros would like to see a weak Hungarian government in place that can be blackmailed, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said on Wednesday.
Due to crisis management after 2010 and efforts to put energy service providers, some banks and a part of the German-owned media under national control, the government ceased to be exposed to blackmail, Orbán said at a meeting of ruling Fidesz and KDNP party lawmakers in Visegrád, in northern Hungary, on Wednesday evening.
“No country can be independent in the absence of a national media. Nor can it be independent, if it can be blackmailed by financial means,” Orbán said, as quoted by national daily Magyar Idők.
For this reason, the stake of the forthcoming general election in April is whether Hungary will have an independent government or one that can be blackmailed. The latter would give up national independence and let Hungary be transformed into a migrant country, he said.
Quoting a foreign statesman, Orbán said that hopelessness generates hatred.
He added that the opposition is expected to launch a hate campaign in the 50 days to come.
“This is their only message. They want to hunt down all of us because we stand in the way of those who want to turn Hungary into a migrant country and Europe into a migrant continent,” he said.
Orbán said that there is “a smear-campaign being waged from abroad against the governing parties, with the help of international organisations and newspapers”. They are being paid by “interest groups” that expect “a pay-off” if “they manage to achieve” that there is a government change in Hungary, the prime minister said.
“Foreign energy companies want to get the profits back they had lost because of the utility price cuts and banks want to off-set the losses they accumulated on the banking tax”, he said.
“In addition, the international political left is working to force migrants onto us with the help of Soros and Brussels, which ought to happen rather soon, already this summer, as it has been by accident revealed by the Belgian prime minister,” he added.
“But we are not alone”, Orbán insisted, noting the formation of the Visegrád Group he described as a strong alliance of central European countries.
“We are on a common footing with our neighbours, Serbia and Romania, as well and we have allies in Vienna, too”, said Orbán, adding that in the German state of Bavaria a government firmly committed to Christian values had been formed.
In addition to this, the governments of leading powers, in Washington, Beijing and Moscow, consider Hungary a friend, Orbán said.
