EU Pursues Rule Of Law In Hungary Despite Orban Re-election

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban's thumping re-election victory does not negate his government's duty to uphold EU norms on rule of law, including LGBTQ rights, the bloc's justice commissioner said Tuesday

Brussels, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 12th Apr, 2022 ) :Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban's thumping re-election victory does not negate his government's duty to uphold EU norms on rule of law, including LGBTQ rights, the bloc's justice commissioner said Tuesday.

The obligation to hew to European standards remains intact, commissioner Didier Reynders said, following a meeting of EU justice and European affairs ministers in Luxembourg.

But Hungary's justice minister, Judit Varga, argued that voters had shown they were unconcerned by Brussels claims of democratic backsliding in their country.

"Our voters... do not share these concerns," she said, underlining the overwhelming majority Orban -- a nationalist and ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin -- received on April 3 for a fourth term.

She also argued that, with war raging in Ukraine, the European Union should "focus on those topics which unite us instead of those topics which (drive) wedges between us".

Reynders told reporters after the meeting that "a majority in the population is not enough of course to prove that you don't have discrimination".

Rule of law in the EU was not only about the democratic support a government receives but also democratic rules the governing majority needs to abide by, he said.

"We need to protect the minorities," he said, adding that under a recent law passed by Budapest, "We are sure that in Hungary.

.. there is a discrimination against the LGBTQ community".

- Hungary in EU crosshairs - The EU ministers had held a regular stocktaking of rule of law in the bloc, focusing this time on Malta, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Austria, and Hungary.

It was Hungary, though, that was in the EU crosshairs.

The European Commission last week announced it was launching a never-used procedure against Budapest that could see its EU funding cut for flouting democratic standards.

Along with minority rights, Brussels is particularly concerned about a deterioration of media diversity and corruption in Hungary.

The announced procedure against Hungary requires endorsement by a super-majority among the EU's 27 member states.

An official letter informing the Hungarian government of the start of the procedure is expected to be sent at the end of April, a European source said.

The conditionality mechanism was created in 2020, after a summit at the height of the coronavirus pandemic that agreed common borrowing to build an 800-billion-euro ($870 billion) pile of grants and loans to help EU economies recover.

Once set in motion, the procedure is expected to take between six and nine months to implement.

Asked to comment on the process, Varga said: "We have to see the letter first... and carefully analyse it."