A dozen police officers were sent out to search the offices of Budapest’s Ökotárs Alapítvány Monday morning and then at noon, investigators arrived at the offices of another NGO called the Foundation for the Development of Democratic Rights. The police arrived unannounced to both locations and prohibited employees to make any phone calls using office telephones, as they ransacked both headquarters.
According to index.hu, over the course of the afternoon, police also searched the offices of a Budapest accountant who had worked for the two foundations.
By 5:00 PM Budapest time, police had completed several searches of the private homes of numerous Ökotárs employees. One such employee, Veronika Móra, happened to be on the phone with Klubrádió, giving an interview, when the line cut out and the voice of a state investigator came on the other end to inform her of the police search.
Protest poster
At just before 6:00 PM Budapest time, police were still seaching Ökotárs offices. Supporters of the NGO are organizing a protest in front of the organization’s offices for Monday evening.
Last week, the pro-regime Magyar Nemzet daily newspaper alleged that Ökotárs had used funds to provide other NGO groups with loans. Police confirmed that it was based on these allegations appearing in the pro-Orbán weekly that they began an investigation. Ms. Móra confirmed that the organization had provided civil groups with one-time, temporary loans, but that this was entirely legal and that it had never entered into regular loan agreements with any other party.
Ever since April 2014, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s government has attacked Ökotárs and the Norwegian Fund, because the latter did not permit the government to directly oversee the aid that Hungary received from Norway. Minister János Lázár claimed that Ökotárs was tied to the left-centre Politics Can be Different (LMP) party. This allegation proved to be false, after which the regime began to claim that it had evidence of inappropriate financial dealings. The government ordered an audit, which found that despite some minor administrative problems, Ökotárs’ financial practices were sound.
The Norwegian Fund will not permit the Hungarian government to oversee these funds and Norwegian ministers have been especially vocal in calling on the European Union to take punitive action against the Orbán regime’s increasingly authoritarian politics and practices. The EU has since confirmed that it will take no such action against Mr. Orbán’s government.
