At their press conference in Brussels on Thursday, the members of the European Parliament dealing with the rule of law criteria assessed that the Hungarian measures taken to eliminate violations of the rule of law were inadequate.
Petri Sarvamaa, the Finnish representative of the European People's Party, said at the press conference that the European Commission interpreted its task "very narrowly" when it objected to specific Hungarian corruption cases and conflicts of interest in relation to public procurement.
In his opinion, this is just a slice of the rule of law problems in Hungary. As he said, it is possible that Hungary has now started to move in the right direction, but in relation to the 17 measures proposed by the Hungarian government, "which they managed to quickly push through the Hungarian parliament", the conclusion cannot yet be drawn that the rule of law has been restored in Hungary.
– We expect the European Commission to evaluate the situation next Tuesday in accordance with what we said, we maintain that there are still risks in Hungary.
We expect the committee to recommend to the council the suspension of EU funds, the size of the amount may be a matter of debate
he emphasized.
Spanish socialist representative Eider Gardiazabal Rubial emphasized that the purpose of the regulation on the rule of law is to protect the EU budget and not to sanction individual governments. In his opinion, only two of the 17 proposals of the package of measures proposed by the Hungarian government are appropriate, and the Hungarian government has implemented only three of them so far.
The representative expressed doubts as to whether the European Commission is using the mechanism correctly and asked the board to maintain the proposal related to the freezing of EU funds in relation to Hungary.
According to Moritz Körner, the German representative of the Renew faction of the EP, the European Commission does not properly interpret the mechanism and does not use the tools provided by it. Regarding the package of Hungarian proposals, he said that since the legislation had only just been created, the committee should withhold EU funds in the very first step, until the Hungarian government proves in practice that the legislation works. He added:
if the EU committee accepts the Hungarian government's promises, then Ursula Von der Leyen, the president of the board, will be held personally responsible for not doing anything to eradicate corruption in Hungary.
Daniel Freund, a representative of the Greens faction of the EU Parliament, said that there is a lot of evidence about the corruption of the Hungarian government. The tying up of EU funds takes place in an organized manner from the highest level, on the instructions of Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, he declared.
Freund also agreed that the European Commission fulfilled its task "in too narrow a sense", as there are many other rule of law problems in Hungary besides corruption. In his opinion, none of the 17 measures proposed by the Hungarian government will improve the situation of the rule of law in Hungary, as it does not provide a solution to concerns related to judicial independence, among others, and the Integrity Authority, which is supposed to eliminate corruption, does not have law enforcement powers.
The Hungarian justice system has been taken prisoner by the government, Viktor Orbán's relatives can continue to enjoy impunity
he said.
Daniel Freund recommends that the committee first withhold EU funds, then monitor the implementation and application of the new Hungarian legislation in the long term, and if they lead to a positive result, Hungary can receive the EU funds.
The European Council will review the Hungarian situation in December, while the European Commission will review it on November 19.
MTI
Cover photo: Daniel Freund / Photo: Emilie GOMEZ / EP
