We all know and admire the art of Maestro Placido Domingo, the great opera singer, conductor and musical director. He was born in Spain, raised in Mexico; his singing career blossomed in the United States and continued in Europe. The 75-year old is well known in Budapest, he visited Hungary several times and the Maestro even considered bringing Ferenc Erkel’s […]
Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orbán did not mince his words on Tuesday in Budapest, at a joint press conference with Austrian Chancellor Christian Kern. On the same day that Hillary Clinton formally became the presidential nominee of the U.S. Democratic Party, the Hungarian Prime Minister declared the following: “Republican foreign policy is good for Europe and represents life for Hungary. In contrast, the Democratic Party’s […]
Prime Minister Viktor Orbán became the first sitting leader of a European Union country to formally endorse Republican Presidential Candidate Donald Trump. Speaking at a gathering of right-wing politicians, thinkers and youth, in the heart of the Hungarian-majority region of Romania called Székelyföld (or Szeklerland), Mr. Orbán declared: “Trump would be better for Europe and for Hungary.” He then referred […]
A couple of days ago President Bill Clinton talked about the Hungarian and Polish governments during a rally in New Jersey. “Poland and Hungary – two countries that would not be free but for the United States and the long Cold War – have now decided this democracy is too much trouble,” and continued to say “they want Putin-like dictatorships.” […]
What the highest ranking representatives of the Orbán government are doing by invoking the name of the 85 year old American-Hungarian billionaire philanthropist George Soros, as the secret source of all evil, is truly unbecoming of any EU member state and is an overall embarrassment. In an effort to distract public attention from the growing corruption scandals around the Central […]
Zsuzsanna Szelényi is a foreign policy analyst and Member of Parliament affiliated with the centre-left Együtt (Together) Party. Ms. Szelényi argues that through Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s war against the West and Moscow’s highly effective use of 21st century hybrid warfare, Hungary is being turned into a colony of Vladimir Putin’s Russia. We are translating Ms. Szelényi’s insightful analysis from the […]
On Friday, an unusual video surfaced featuring Gáspár Orbán, the 24 year old son of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán. Gáspár had hoped to evade media attention, despite being a former professional soccer player and the prime minister’s son. In 2014, he sent a letter to the editor of the 444.hu website requesting that they never write articles about him, […]
Viktor Orbán’s Hungary has become a favorite seminar subject at North American universities; numerous talks and articles analyze the country’s sudden authoritarian turn. On January 21, Vladimir Tismaneanu and Marius Stan gave a talk at the University of California at Berkeley entitled Orbanism, Putinism, and the New Onslaught on Liberal Democracy. (Details here.) Mr. Tismaneanu is a Professor of Politics […]
The title of this article might seem overly polemical, but I can’t think of a more accurate way to describe plans that were leaked this week to lay off 20% of the civil servants working in key national public institutions in 2016, followed by a further 10% in layoffs in 2017. This year’s 20% reduction will put 6,000 Hungarian civil […]
Over a thousand protesters took to the streets of Budapest on Sunday, to protest the Orbán regime’s proposed amendment to the Fundamental Law of Hungary (the new constitution introduced by Fidesz in 2011), which give sweeping powers to the government and completely sideline parliament, whenever authorities decide that a “state of terror” is imminent. According to the proposed amendment, Prime […]
