Ben Horton
Good afternoon, everyone, or good morning to anyone joining us from the US or further afield. My name’s Ben Horton and I am Head of the Director’s Office here at Chatham House and it’s wonderful to be invited back to moderate another of these Members’ Question Time events, our monthly series where members get to raise their concerns about the critical issues shaping international relations. And today, we’re talking about Hungary and its role in European security. I’m delighted to be joined by my colleague, Armida van Rij, to discuss this important topic. Armida leads the Europe Programme at Chatham House and has extensive expertise in all issues relating to the future of the European Union, European security policy and Europe’s role in the world.
Under Viktor Orbán, Hungary’s relationship with the EU and NATO has fundamentally changed. Orbán has turned Hungary into a model for democratic backsliding across Europe and his actions have inspired populist leaders to push back against the stated values of the European Union, threatening the unity and stability of Europe. But his influence doesn’t stop there. His alignment with authoritarian powers, like Russia and China, or with the second Trump Presidency, and his increasingly combative stance within the institutions Hungary is part of, including during its Presidency of the Council of the European Union last year, has raised serious questions about Hungary’s role within Europe.
Last year at Chatham House, we hosted Hungarian Foreign Minister, Péter Szijjártó, who when asked whether the EU would change Hungary’s politics, replied instead that “Hungary would change the EU.” This rhetoric and behaviour challenges not only the cohesion of European decision-making, but also, the collective security and shared principles that underpin the transatlantic alliance. So, there is a lot to discuss here and relatively little time.
Some housekeeping before we dive into it. This event is on the record and a video will be published afterwards. We encourage people to tweet or share thoughts on Bluesky or LinkedIn, or whatever social media platform you happen to be using, Truth Social if you really want, following the hashtag #CHEvents and tagging us @ChathamHouse. If you’d like to ask a question, you can do so by submitting it in the Q&A box that will appear at the bottom of your Zoom feed, and I’ll try my best to get as – to as many of those as possible, as well as covering the great questions that were sent in beforehand by some of the audience today.
So, I’m going to hand over now to Armida for some opening thoughts, before diving into the Q&A. At the end of the discussion, our lovely Events Team will share a poll where you can vote on an aspect of what you’ve heard today, so please stay tuned for that. Over to you, Armida. Thanks very much for joining us and thanks, also, for observing the dress code. I’m glad that we’ve got matching jackets for this one. Over to you.
Armida van Rij
We like being matchy-matchy for Chatham House events. Thanks very much, Ben, and great to be here and great to be doing this, to talk about Hungary. As you say, we’ve looked at Hungary a little bit in the Europe Programme in the past. We had the Foreign Minister last year, who certainly gave us a lot of food for thought, let’s put it that way. So, I guess just to, kind of, set the scene a little bit, I’ll talk a little bit about, you know, where we are in terms of Hungary’s relations with the rest of Europe and then, a couple of things to look out for.
The first thing to say is that Orbán, Hungary’s Prime Minister, has made his intentions very, very clear. He already announced, in 2014 in a speech, that he wants to build an ‘illiberal democracy’ in Hungary. So, this is not new, you know, he came to power in 2010, this is not new, and he’s been really embarking on that path since then and he’s very open about what he wants to achieve. He’s also carried on with his Eastern opening policy, which is essentially, a strategy whereby he further increases financial and economic and energy dependence on Russia and China, and he’s carried on doing that regardless of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. We also know, of course, that he argues for “a Europe of nation states,” as he calls it, and wants a return of competencies to the capitals, rather than further EU integration, which is very much what the Foreign Minister was talking about when he was here at Chatham House. You know, they want to bring sovereignty and bring power back to the capitals, which in my view, is a fundamental misunderstanding of how the EU works, but we can maybe get to that later.
But what I think is interesting is that when we look at the public in Hungary, they really look to, especially the EU, less so NATO, ‘cause that’s a different institution altogether, but especially the EU as an economic bloc and really, they really focus on the funding side of things. So, they like EU money, but they don’t necessarily subscribe to the fact that it’s also a values-based bloc and a trading-based bloc. And so, the result we’ve seen is that Orbán regularly uses his veto in council meetings to blackmail, or essentially, uses it as blackmail to extrapolate concessions in widely other areas that might be completely unrelated. So, really, the Orbán challenge, and I think this is specific to Orbán and not necessarily to Hungary, and I do want to make that distinction, is twofold. The first is the democratic backsliding that we’ve seen, which I’m sure we’ll come to discuss, and the second is Orbán’s general obstructiveness in, you know, the various sort of institutions that we’ve talked about, so the EU and NATO.
I think there’s two things to look out for over the next – kind of, in the short-term, so the next couple of years, which will be interesting. The first is a domestic point, which is that there’s been challenge to Orbán and there’s been challenge to Fidesz’s rule in Hungary, which has come from a former ally, Péter Magyar, who is a former member of Fidesz. His ex – now ex-wife was the Minister of Justice in one of Orbán’s governments, but he set up this new party, Tisza, which did exceptionally well in the European Parliamentary elections back in June. It came closely second to Fidesz, which was completely unexpected, and even today, the polls between Fidesz and Tisza are really neck-and-neck in the domestic polls.
I should say that the Parliamentary elections are two and a half years away in Hungary, so it’s a little while to go and we’re seeing a lot of, kind of, tit-for-tat in the media, in the Hungarian media, actually, in terms of accusations and all that kind of thing. But I think that is certainly – that has woken up Fidesz and has woken up Orbán. We – if you remember, Ben, over the summer, when Hungary assumed the EU Council Presidency, Orbán suddenly embarked on this jet-setting trip and he went to Ukraine to see Zelenskyy, he went to Moscow, he went to China. All of these things were unplanned, and he was talking about them as ‘peace missions’. And sure, we can talk about the, kind of, European and international consequences of those, but I think that was really intended for his domestic audience, to show that he still has agency, he’s still in charge, he still, you know, takes ownership over these issues. So, we can’t forget that domestic political angle.
And then, the second thing to look out for, which I think will be particularly interesting and is particularly relevant for our discussion today, is the Orbán-Trump relationship and how that’s going to evolve. As we’ve talked about and written about at Chatham House previously, Orbán has built very close ties with Trump over the past four years, while Trump was not in office. Built very close ties with the MAGA wing of the Republican Party. Trump even namechecked Orbán positively during the only presidential debate in the run-up to the US elections. So, they’re really building these ties. Orbán – sorry, Trump spoke via video link at one of Orbán’s ultra-conservative conferences in Hungary. So, there’s really very close ties and they share a lot of values, as opposed to Orbán sharing values with the rest of his EU leaders.
So, they agree on this, kind of, anti-woke agenda, on the perceived existential threat of immigration, the need for traditional family values, etc. So, they agree on all of that, but what I think is particularly interesting in this is the China dimension, which there’s been a bit of talk in Republican circles about, “But we shouldn’t be this close to Orbán and to Hungary because of China,” that doesn’t seem to have made its way quite to the top just yet, and I haven’t heard Trump talk about this. But China and Hungary have built an incredibly close relationship as well. So, China has invested €16 billion of foreign direct investment into Hungary. Again, the Hungarian Foreign Minister talked about this. They have just opened a – a Chinese company has just opened an electric car manufacturing plant in Hungary. Trump also doesn’t like EVs, let’s remember that.
When Xi came to Europe in May 2024, he visited Hungary, France and Serbia, but he elevated Hungary’s relationship with China to sitting just below Russia and Pakistan. So, Hungary’s seen as China’s, kind of – well, certainly on paper, as China’s third most important ally. So, we know how Trump feels about China, so I think this will be quite interesting to see how that’s going to play out and whether Orbán will be able to continue his, kind of, two-way – two directional path, or whether Trump is going to make an issue about that.
Ben Horton
Armida, thank you so much for that overview, and everyone, keep your questions coming in. We’ve had a few good ones already, so we’ll get to that. Please do share whatever you think about what you’ve just heard. Armida, before we go onto the, kind of, audience Q&A, I did want to just talk to you and ask you something about something that we’d picked up in the introduction, of Hungary acting as a, kind of, role model for other states in Europe to adopt these, kind of, authoritarian or democratic backsliding, kind of, tendencies. So, I just wondered, obviously, kind of, causation is quite hard to, sort of, judge in these things, but do you think that Orbán has been – is acting as this, kind of, role model and what are we seeing elsewhere in Europe as a result of the way that he’s conducted his foreign policy?
Armida van Rij
Yes, I mean, absolutely, and I think it’s worth maybe just a word on, kind of, Orbán’s roots. Where he didn’t start out being like this, but he concluded that this was the way that he could hold onto power best in Hungary. And so, you know, what does illiberalism and democratic backsliding look like in Orbán’s Hungary, which we’re now seeing in a few other places in Europe? It’s anti-LGBTQ legislation, it’s restricted academic freedoms and civil society freedoms. It’s corrupting the independence of the media, consolidating control over the judiciary, which is then used to pass laws, to hold onto even more power. There’s further cronyism, there’s lots of allegations of corruption. So, it’s really the capture of national democratic institutions.
And again, Orbán did this relatively quickly when he came to power in Hungary in 2010. His then closest ally became Poland, from 2016 to 2023, when the Law and Order Party was in office, and there, it was exactly the same kind of things that we saw there. So, they installed allies in the judiciary, in the prosecution services, in public media and they really did all of this through unlawful means, including in some cases, violations of Poland’s constituency and really undermined civil liberties. You might’ve remembered the protests about the abortion laws that they – or the abortion bans, I should say, that they passed.
But what I think the key point here is that Poland’s also a really good example of demonstrating how difficult it is – once the backsliding has started and once attacks on rule of law have started, it’s really difficult to reverse it. So, so far, you know, Tusk’s government has been unable to undo the state capture of the media under Law and Order, but it’s really struggling to repair the independence of the judiciary. And that then has ramifications for how people feel about Tusk and his government.
But to your question in terms of how this is being replicated elsewhere, we’re also seeing this in Italy, for example, eroding of media freedom, attacking the independence of the judiciary, violation of protections of human rights. So, this is, kind of, being duplicated elsewhere and I mean, you know, you can’t say Orbán is the cause of all of that, but it’s certain that leaders who have similar affiliations look at what’s been achieved in – I say ‘achieved’ in a, kind of, quote-unquote way, look at what’s been achieved in Hungary and draw lessons from that, very clearly.
What I will say, though, sorry, just on that, just on the populism and backsliding thing. I think we do need to distinguish a little bit between domestic policy and foreign policy. Where not all countries who have followed Orbán’s playbook in terms of domestic policy and domestic democratic backsliding are necessarily doing that in the foreign policy domain, as well, and I think that’s where, again, Italy is quite an interesting example.
Ben Horton
Yeah, absolutely. Thank you very much, and so, we’ve got a question – I’m going to turn to some of the questions now. We’ve got a question here from Brian, who has asked, kind of, specifically about how NATO is handling the security implications of Hungary’s membership, and, you know, “Is Hungary, for example, excluded from highly classified meetings?” I’d love your thoughts on that particular point, but maybe also we broaden it out and just you speak a little bit on how other countries within Europe, and the institutions we’ve been talking about, have been responding to Orbán. Have there – has there been an emerging, kind of, set of tools or tactics to, sort of, oppose the way that he’s conducting this business?
Armida van Rij
Yeah. I mean, what’s really difficult is that neither NATO nor the EU have a mechanism to effectively pick another ally or member state out. So, it’s – you, kind of, have to work within the framework of what there is, and in NATO specifically, the EU has a few mechanisms which we can talk about. They’re not very effective, but anyway, but we can talk about that more in a second, if useful. But NATO is more limited in that regard and where we’re really seeing the impact is on alliance cohesion. So, this was very clearly exposed when he came to Sweden’s accession to NATO, where Hungary and Turkey were the two holdouts, and Hungary, for a really, really long time. And that just – yeah, that just makes it very, very difficult.
But I think the other element is that Hungary is now getting within NATO, a, kind of, disproportionately significant role because of its, you know, powers and influence, and so, it has negotiated optouts of support for Ukraine, for example. So, some of those things are very visible. I should say that what I think is quite interesting is that, and the Hungarian Foreign Minister said this himself, they don’t believe that Russia would attack a NATO country, because we sit under the Article 5 umbrella. So, there’s somewhat irony there, where, you know, on the one hand, Hungary’s protected because of that Article 5 collective defence article, but at the same time, they are being obstructive and are actually undermining the collective defence clause as a result of their actions.
But what I will say is because they don’t believe that, they have, so far, worked within NATO and signed up for areas that might, for example, draw countries into conventional engagement with Russia. So, for example, Hungary is part of the regional plans that NATO’s drawn up and has, kind of, forces allocated to that. So, again, there’s a – there’s sometimes a bit of a disconnect between what’s actually happening at the working level and the, kind of, the very visible issues that we see, but the visible issues have an impact and are then used by our adversaries to undermine the alliance.
Ben Horton
Absolutely, yeah, thank you, and I wanted to come now to a question from Nevin, who has a question, really, about values. Because I mean, we said something relatively cards on the table in the introduction about the, sort of, stance of Hungary being counter to European values and the values of the European Union, and Nevin, I think, just wants to, kind of, challenge this a little bit. And he’s said, “When the Hungarian LGBT legislation came to the EU agenda, the response of EU leaders was to come up with a declaration that ended up being signed by the countries of, kind of, old Europe or Western Europe. While the, sort of, newer European Union members were less keen to sign it.”
So, I think what Nevin’s getting at there is, you know, to what extent are the values we’re talking about, kind of, Western held values versus, kind of, universal values? And is there a danger that by, kind of, making these values absolutely core to the, kind of, identity of the European Union and these institutions, that you’re actually providing ammunition to the likes of Orbán to say, “Look, these institutions are not on our side,” and, sort of, providing fuel to the fire, I suppose, of their, kind of, domestic political agendas?
Armida van Rij
Yeah. I mean, the slightly nebulous logo and – slogan of the EU is “United in diversity,” right? And I think that’s very much how the EU and their – and also, NATO, works. But I wouldn’t want to, I guess, confuse with what are fundamental liberal democratic values, so, for example, believing in an independent judiciary, believing in the rule of law, those kinds of things. And so, there might be particular areas where that gets a little bit more fuzzy for some member states, but there are just essential pieces of what constitutes a liberal democracy that Hungary doesn’t subscribe to. And as I said, you know, it’s not the only ally or member state, and I’m sure there will continue to be challenges to this, or it certainly won’t be the last challenge. But there is a bit of an element of, you know, if you want to be part of the club, you have to play according to the rules of the club and that has to be subscribing to liberal democracies and everything that comes with that.
Ben Horton
Thank you, thank you very much, yeah. Okay, I would like to now move onto a sense of – I mean, you spoke a little bit about how this approach supports, kind of, Orbán’s own – the strength of his own regime domestically. But I did wonder if you could talk a bit about, you know, are there other elements to what he wants that he’s getting out of this approach? So, Leslie has asked us a question here, a fact that – something I was not aware of at all, which is that apparently, Orbán has been seen wearing a scarf with a map of greater Hungary when he goes to international football matches. And Leslie asks, “Is he sending a message about territorial ambitions there?” But I think just to broaden that question out, you know, what, ultimately, does Orbán want? Does he want to fundamentally change the dynamics of the European Union or wider Europe, or is he just looking to shore up his own, kind of, domestic regime? Does he want the European Union to, essentially, give him a quiet life? What’s the purpose of all of this?
Armida van Rij
Hmmm. So, I think, I mean, there is an element of – and polling shows this, which is quite interesting, that Orbán makes Hungarians feel like their voice matters and like their place in Europe matters. And so, it’s, kind of, given them some, kind of, what’s the term? I guess some respect for themselves back, perhaps, in a way that didn’t quite happen, or that, you know, Hungary came out of the Soviet Union, struggled economically for a very long time, was hit very hard by the various financial crises. So, they feel like Orbán has given them back those kinds of – those feelings.
But what I think is really interesting is that Orbán has never really, as far as I’m aware, anyway – doesn’t really talk about wanting to leave the EU or wanting to leave NATO, because that’s what his leverage is. He knows that he has the most leverage when he’s part of these institutions, and instead, he wants to fundamentally change them. And that’s what we were talking about at the start, which is about bringing power and sovereignty back to capitals. I mean, I think there’s also a domestic element on which, you know, its International First think tank, so we won’t go in – too much into that, but there are allegations of corruption, of cronyism, within the Orbán regime in Hungary. So, I’m sure there’s also elements of financial game – gain, etc., for himself and some of his allies, as well.
But for him, it really seems to be about changing the nature of the institutions, and I think it’s worth saying, he’s invested heavily in Brussels to actually make this happen. So, he’s not just, you know – and I think this is quite interesting if we compare it to, say, the Dutch Government when they just came in, al – which also has a far right, or an far right and a populist parties as part of the gov – and the government. It took them a few months to realise that if you want to play the game in Brussels and if you want to be heard, you need to play the game in Brussels and you need to invest. Whereas Orbán has absolutely realised this and he’s invested heavily, you know. He holds a conference there every year, the National Conservative – Conservatism Conference. He has established a branch of the MCC, which is, essentially, an Orbán affiliated ‘think tank’.
So, he invests heavily in institutions in Brussels and makes sure that he is building his allies around Brussels, as well. And we’ve seen this very clearly after the – following the European Parliamentary elections, where he established a new grouping in the European Parliament called ‘Pates – Patriots of Europe’, where he was joined by similar parties, or parties who share his views, from the Czech Republic, from France, from Spain, from the Netherlands. So, he is really building these relations and all of that amounts to, potentially, a fundamentally changed EU.
Ben Horton
Thanks, Armida. I’d like to zoom out, sort of, beyond Europe, I guess, a little bit now, and bring in a couple of questions that were sent to us in advance about firstly, someone answering – asking very clearly, sort of, you know, “What does this mean for Europe’s relationship with Donald Trump during his second Presidency?” But also, thinking, as well, about what you’ve said about Orbán’s ties with the likes of Russia and China. I suppose, what do you think is likely to be the impact of these ties? Is there a way that Orbán can use these to his advantage? But then, I’d like to flip it, as well, a little bit, and just – and maybe pushback on the framing of our event, in the sense that, you know, we are living in a world now where we’re seeing increasing volatility in relationships, where things are becoming far more transactional. Where our, kind of, values-based foreign policy is becoming harder to pursue without a bit of hardnosed realism, if one might put it that way.
Isn’t there an argument to say that, you know, the likes of the countries in the European Union and arguably the UK, should be trying to build more constructive relationships with the likes of China or the likes of Russia, or indeed, the likes of, you know, of course the United States? Like, just because members of the European Parliament might not like the way that Donald Trump approaches politics or foreign policy, it doesn’t mean we can just ignore the fact that the United States has a President like that. So, I just wonder, you know, is – are we overplaying the extent to which Orbán’s closeness with these leaders is a negative? Like, is there a way that Europe could spin that to its advantage?
Armida van Rij
I mean, there’s authoritarian leaders and there’s authoritarian leaders, right? So, let’s – I mean, Russia invaded a sovereign state and wants to take away the right of that state to exist as an independent country. So, that’s something different from China or Turkey or some of the other actors that we might be referring to when we talk about authoritarian states. There – what I think we can’t ignore, though, is the Russia-China axis, the fact that Europe is struggling to see that Europe is struggling to axis as one comprehensive or systemic, rather, security threat. Is therefore, applying, a, kind of, very compartmentalised and pillared approach to responding to those threats individually, rather than as one big thing. And that then, through Orbán, exposes Europe’s vulnerabilities when it comes to this and also, impacts its ability to respond. I mean, the fact that Orbán continues to be difficult over sanctions packages on Russia, has opted out of NATO’s support for Ukraine, as I mentioned, that fragments the EU and NATO. And I mean, yeah, that is part of the picture, as you were saying, of a, kind of, more fragmented global order.
Having said that, the – and just on the EU rather than NATO, because again, different kind of organisation, but the EU claims to be a normative values-based institution. And so, if it claims to be that and if it claims to still want to continue to be that, it has to uphold that. And also, I mean, the other fact is let’s not forget when refugees and asylum seekers look for alternative homes, they don’t go knocking on the doors of China, Iran, North Korea, etc. They come knocking on the doors of the US and Europe for a reason, and that is partially because of our values. So, I think we shouldn’t undersell ourselves in that way.
On your point on building bridges and building relations, particularly because, you know, the next four years, with Trump’s re-election, are going to be difficult for Europe, there’s no denying that whatsoever, but because of Orbán’s actions over such a long timeframe now, he has lost legitimacy within NATO and within the EU and he can’t carry them, if you will. He can’t carry the other member states and the other allies in relations with Trump. And I also don’t think that they would want to Orbán to speak on their behalf, because again, they – you know, he’s so opposed to many of the things that they don’t want, particularly when it comes to support for Ukraine.
So, that’s where I think Meloni from Italy might play a more significant role, because she has more support and is more popular, relatively speaking, certainly within NAT – within the EU. Our fire alarm was going off, so apologies, listeners, if you can hear that. It’s just a test. So, Meloni might play that role instead, but I think there would be a lot of pushback from, say, European Commission President von der Leyen, who really doesn’t like Orbán anymore at this point, and has had various issues and encounters with him over the previous five years of her term as Commission President. And, you know, she froze funds – cohesion funds to Hungary and COVID recovery funds to Hungary, over these concerns of backsliding. So, she will not allow him to speak, certainly for the Commission, to Trump or Putin or China. But then, on behalf of the other member states, I mean, yeah, António Costa, who’s the Council President, or Meloni, are far more likely options, I would say.
On China and some other authoritarian regimes, of course we need to keep dialogue open, we need to keep speaking to them, but again, they fall a little bit in a different than Russia, who has just invaded another state. Of course, we can’t just ignore, as I was saying, the link between China and Russia and China’s enablement of Russia’s War in Ukraine. Which I think does need to be tackled as a more comprehensive package, but that’s different from invading another country, altogether.
Ben Horton
Yeah, thank you very much. I – just on that point about Russia, I wonder if I could bring in a question now from Christina DeCoursey, who really just wants to understand a bit more about why Orbán has sought this relationship with Russia, but also the extent to which he’s, kind of, valorised Russian civilisation and the strength of its history and seems so drawn to the idea of Russia. Christina points out that “For most of the,” kind of, “former Soviet republics and un – and previously occupied territories of the Soviet Union, there’s – they’re terrified about what may come next after Ukraine, depending on how that rolls out. And many of these republics are very clear that they don’t want to return to an age of Russian dominance.” So, Christina just wants the – your take on how Orbán understands this and why he doesn’t see Russia as the threat that many of these other countries do.
Armida van Rij
Hmmm. I think – so, one of the factors that I think is interesting is that Hungary, together with Poland and another country, was one of the first few countries from The Warsaw Pact to join NATO, in I think it was 99. So, quite a while ago and relatively speaking, fairly quickly after the collap0se of the Soviet Union. So, I think there’s a, kind of, interesting hiscor – historical perspective there. I think, ultimately, Orbán does what he thinks is best for Hungary and for himself, and he will pursue that no matter what, essentially. I mean, yes, there’s elements about Hungary’s very reliant on Russian energy and on Chinese investments, but the Chinese investments piece is really more recent. The Russian energy piece is longer.
But I think he will – he has calculated that he thinks this works for him, and I think there’s also an element of strongman politics to all of this, where Orbán is a strong man, Putin is a strong man, Erdoğan is a strong man, and Trump is a strong man. So, they – there’s something about, to some extent, I guess, they understand each other’s language and they speak that language, and I think that creates a sense of we can talk when we have to talk, essentially.
Ben Horton
Absolutely, yeah, thank you. I’d like to just take a quick spin back to Hungary’s, kind of, domestic politics, if I may, just because we’ve had a question come in from Ambassador Ferenc Kumin, who is actually the Ambassador of Hungary to the UK. Thank you for joining us today. It’s great to have you with us. Who, essentially, is asking a question about this idea of democratic backsliding versus just Hungarian opposition being ineffective at the, kind of, national level, at winning power. And his contention is that, you know, “Surely democratic backsliding will be over at the point where an opposition force gathers the ability to win Parliamentary elections.” So, I just wanted to put that to you, just simply just to get your sense of a response.
Armida van Rij
Yeah, thanks, Ben, and thank you, Ambassador, thanks for joining. I mean, I just can’t see how a opposition can function in a country without media freedom and without an independent judiciary. And we know from various reports, whether we’re talking about Transparency International, Human Rights Watch and others, that those things have been eroded, including the Commission’s Report, actually, that those things have been – those freedom’s have been eroded in Hungary. And so, I think it is very difficult to mount that opposition when you don’t have an independent media, you don’t have an independent judiciary who can, kind of, speak and write freely.
The other element, as well, is, well, you know, we talked about this earlier, but Péter Magyar and Tisza, who he came from Fidesz. So, even though he’s now hot on the heels of Orbán’s party, he’s not exactly a revolutionary. He’s not exactly, you know, a hippy leftie, to put it very crudely. So, there is clearly something that – about Hungarian society that appeals to, I guess, more conservative values than in other parts of Europe, and that’s completely fine. But the issue is when we don’t have the freedom – free media, we don’t have the independent judiciary, we don’t have civil society, vibrant civil society organisations who can contribute to that ecosystem of civil liberties.
But perhaps Ambassador, we can continue this discussion.
Ben Horton
Yes, yeah, and please do come and visit us at Chatham House again and we can continue that. Okay, great. I wanted to now turn to another question that’s been brought in, which is just thinking about, again, the avenues that the European Union has to respond to Hungary’s approach to its foreign policy. And they’ve brought up one which is, essentially, just to ask you, do you think that expansion of the European Union is an opportunity where rules could be revised on things like unanimous voting, which might decrease Hungary’s power to influence the business of the European Union? I just wondered what you thought about that, and maybe if you want to broaden it out just to the, kind of, tools that the EU has at its disposal and that you might see them trying to utilise over the next year or two.
Armida van Rij
Yeah. So, I think the enlargement and/or reform question is really interesting. There – you know, there’s clear consensus, certainly from within the Commission, that EU enlargement has to go hand-in-hand with EU reform, but there’s no appetite to – so, usually, this would have to go through the treaties, and reopening the treaty and undergoing treaty negotiations, which that has to be ratified by every single national Parliament. That’s going to be very difficult and so, there’s little appetite to go through lengthy treaty negotiations, because there’s also no real security that every single Parliament will actually approve it, and that will expose further the divisions within the EU and so, they just don’t want to go there, which is understandable. The last treaty negotiation, or the last treaty, was the Lisbon Treaty, which was ratified in 2009, I’d say – I think agreed in 2007 and ratified in 2009. So, it was possible then. Now, it would be a much more risky strategy.
So, then, the question is what’s possible without treaty reform, essentially? The question is specifically about voting and, you know, can we move from unanimous voting to qualified majority voting? There are views within the EU and the Commission and the think tank community, that actually, this would be possible. But it remains a very difficult decision and particularly small member states feel that – well, they tend to be in opposition of it because they would feel that that would disproportionately benefit the larger member states, like France or like Germany, and so, it would take their power away. And that’s the beauty of having – needing to reach a consensus and unanimous decisions.
On the tools that are available, so there are some tools. The real question, of course, is their effectiveness. There’s three in particular. The first is the nuclear option, which is – it’s called an Article 7 procedure and it, essentially, takes away an EU member state’s voting rights in the European Council or the Council Ministers. So, there, they can’t vote and that then – you know, they, essentially, lose their voice, but that’s the nuclear option. It’s also very difficult to actually enact this, because there has to be unanimity on starting this, and that’s what we’ve seen in the past where it’s been very difficult. I think Belgium tried to – most recently tried to open this against Hungary, it didn’t go anywhere. And of course, Hungary now as, as we’ve talked about, increasingly has allies across the EU and so, very unlikely that the EU 26 would agree on this, not just in Hungary, but any other member state, really.
A second option is what’s called the – if we, kind of, go down from nuclear to the mid-tier options, is what’s called the Rule of Law Conditionality Regulation, which is, essentially, where EU funds, or the distribution of EU funds, can be suspended when the rule of law has been violated. And this has been used several times against Hungary and also, against Poland, under the Law and Order Government that I mentioned previously. But again, it’s a bit of a – the difficulty is that none of these tools are perfect and they are used in a political way. And so, what happened in the case of Hungary, where 6.3 billion was frozen of cohesion funds, just under €10 billion of post-COVID-19 recovery funds, both over concerns over corruption in Hungary. But then, the European Commission released, I think ten billion or something in 2023, because some judicial reforms were made, but also because they wanted to prevent an Orbán veto on support for Ukraine in the European Council. So, all of these procedures and mechanisms then become political and are all interlinked, and that erodes their effectiveness.
And then, the third option, if you will, is – it’s called the infringement action, it’s just quite generic, which is, basically, where a member state is told to remedy the situation at hand or face fines. And I should also say, you know, that the European Commission has an obligation to launch infringement procedures or any of these others, against member states that don’t respect the provisions of the treaties, i.e., don’t ensure that EU law is respected. But as these examples I’ve outlined, it’s very use – it’s very difficult to actually use to ensure consistent change. I will say Hungary is currently still the third largest net benefactor of EU membership and so, there is clear financial leverage there that the Commission could use. We’ve seen this a little bit – there’s been some reports, since von der Leyen’s re-election as Commission President, about using agricultural funds and cohesion funds as that, kind of, leverage. We’ll see.
Ben Horton
Yeah, absolutely, and actually, that just brings us to a point that Alexander raised in the Q&A, as well, about the “link between Hungary’s economic growth and its reliance on EU funding,” and whether that, kind of, “moves the dial either way.” You know, it – whether assisted by China or not, if Hungary’s economy grows, will that diminish the salience of that lever that the EU might have? I don’t know if we’re – unless you want – unless you’ve got, like, a 30-second answer to that, like, I’d quite like to just, kind of, flag it, say thank you to Alexander for asking it and see if we could turn to our poll, which…
Armida van Rij
Hmmm.
Ben Horton
…as we’re coming towards the end, which our lovely events staff have put in place for us.
So, this is, essentially, our question. We hope we’ve given you some food for thought today, so please do vote on this question of, “Will Orbán help or hinder Europe during the Trump presidency?” based on what you’ve heard today. So, we’ll just give you a few seconds and then, I will reveal the results, and Armida, I’d love for you to share your thoughts on that question, as well, once we’ve…
Armida van Rij
I think just…
Ben Horton
…sort of, done the voting.
Armida van Rij
…while we wait for that. I think it is an interesting question of, you know, do we maintain the, kind of, leverage, or do we – or are we just pushing them to seek friends elsewhere? And it’s a really difficult question and I don’t think there’s a perfect answer to that. It’s the same with engagement within NATO, you know, there have been – I’ve seen some uses where they’re trying to make the argument that really, the US should step up its en – its military engagement with Hungary to try and bring them back into the fold, essentially, including through the establishment of military bases, is that necessa – in Hungary. Is that necessarily the best approach? I’m not sure, and also, of course, Hungary has a say over that as well, so they may not want to play ball in that regard.
Ben Horton
Thank you. Great, so we have our poll. Thank you everybody who voted and we’ve – well, we’ve come up with quite – for once, actually, I think for the first time since I’ve been doing this series, we have a very decisive result in the poll. So, “Will Orbán help or hinder Europe during the Trump Presidency?” A whopping 79% of you feel that Orbán will hinder Europe during the Trump Presidency, with 15% of you thinking that he’ll actually be a help and a small number of you still unsure. So, apologies that we’ve not been able to give you clarity to those unsure people, but Armida, I just wonder if you could take us out for this event just with your thoughts on that question of, ultimately, cards on the table, is Orbán going to help or hinder Europe in the next four years?
Armida van Rij
I mean, I think it’s – he’s not going to make things easier and I think he’ll further expose divisions in Europe over China, over Ukraine, over Russia, over how to engage with Trump. And I think certainly, the – António Costa, the Council President, and von der Leyen, will have a really hard time to make sure that all the noses are pointing in the right direction. And I think, you know, Orbán will, essentially, just follow Trump’s line on various different things. So, for example, just briefly and just a few days ago, up until Trump’s speech in Davos, Orbán was threatening to not approve the next sanctions pac – EU sanctions package on Russia. Trump then made a speech in Davos, which clearly put the onus back on Putin rather than on Zelenskyy and then, Orbán wavered. And I think that’s just a clear example of his transactionalism, he always threatens and then eventually relents, but it’s just not helpful, given the geopolitical environment we’re in.
Ben Horton
Armida, thank you so much for that and for your time today and your insights. Thank you, everybody, for joining us for this Members’ Question Time. We will be back on the 25th of February for another discussion, actually this time focusing on China and the role that the People’s Liberation Army plays in China’s international policy. So, please do register for that. You can register right now on our website. If you’ve enjoyed what you’ve heard today, please do share the recording online. It’ll be up in a few hours, I think, on YouTube. Thanks once more for spending time with us over your lunchbreaks and enjoy the rest of your day.
Armida van Rij
Thanks, Ben.
