Veronika Jóźwiak

Brutal. Orbán's government not only saved Patriarch Kirill from EU sanctions but has been sheltering his former number two, Metropolitan Hilarion, in Budapest since 2022. @novayagazeta_en now uncovers Hilarion's secret luxury life in Hungary - and the abuse of a 18-years-old boy.

Viktor Orbán will take center stage at the extraordinary EU summit in a few days. Orbán is blocking EU aid for Ukraine and Sweden’s NATO accession. What does he want? Money? Or something else? Read my interview with the best expert on 🇭🇺+🇪🇺, @eublogo 👇 vsquare.org/katalin-halmai-h…

OK, the Visegrád cooperation is now officially dead. Viktor Orbán's political director Balázs Orbán (Hungary's rumored possible next foreign minister) launches a smear campaign against the new Polish government, accuses it of being part of the 'Soros conspiracy'. There's a lot to unpack here. First, Viktor Orbán claimed a few days ago that, since the Visegrád Group has fallen apart, he is "working on (to figure out) how we can put it back together". Since all political messaging within his government are closely coordinated, his lieutenant's recent attack on the Polish government clearly indicates he wasn't telling the truth. The V4 was instrumental to Orbán as long as it had been an axis of 'illiberal' governments and likeminded leaders (like Andrej Babiš). But it's no use to Orbán anymore, and he's more interested in undermining the new Polish government than trying to mend ties and find some common ground for possible cooperation. These undermining efforts won't hurt Poland much – on the international stage, the country is playing in a very different league than Hungary – but it will further isolate Hungary for sure. Second, both Viktor Orbán and his (current) foreign minister, Péter Szijjártó, said it many times that "we do not interfere or intervene in the internal political processes of other countries" and do not comment on other countries' internal affairs. Obviously, it is also a lie, however, going as far as attacking Poland's minister of justice based on where he graduated, or shaming the marshal of the Sejm for hosting refugees... well, that's a new low for sure in Hungarian-Polish relations. What's completely new here is that, regardless of their differences on Russia and Ukraine, Orbán's government has so far not applied its super aggressive, completely undiplomatic rhetoric when talking about Poland. Now the gloves are off. Third, about Hungary's 'sovereignty efforts', and who is orchestrating what: Árpád Habony and Századvég, Viktor Orbán's long-time spin doctor and the Hungarian government's main advisory/policy think-tank, have been secretly working for the Law and Justice campaign, as we revealed in our latest @VSquare_Project newsletter. Polityka had already wrote a story on how some within Law and Justice blame their election defeat on unnamed 'Hungarian campaign advisors' who pressed for divisive, aggressive messages in the later stages of the campaign – which inadvertently resulted in firing up opposition voters, a huge election turnout, and Donald Tusk's return to power. Now it clearly looks like the Orbán government is unable to learn from its mistake, and still thinks that pushing Law and Justice into even more radicalisation - through feeding them with Hungary-cooked bogus conspiracy theories - will somehow pay off in the end. As someone who deeply cares about Polish-Hungarian relations, I find all this extremely harmful and stupid.

📉Hungary is the 2nd poorest EU country in terms of actual individual consumption, according to Eurostat's latest data. There's a lot of talk about #Hungary's democratic backsliding in recent years – much less about its economic regress. 🔗Read more: ec.europa.eu/eurostat/en/web…