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Things could have gotten worse
– at the same time, perhaps there is a consensus between the rule of law and EU interest groups on the EU budget, who have not yet reached a vineyard.
While the economic crisis caused by the Covid epidemic would require Europe to act in concert, the debate over the rule of law is a gap in cooperation.
This was still agreed today by the Council of EU Member States and the day before by representatives of the Council and the European Parliament. While member state leaders would tend to place the rule of law with less weight on “dirty materials”, the EP voted last week in favor of stricter regulation.
And on the last day of September, the European Commission put its report on the table, which shows that the rule of law is being violated in Hungary. Problems have been identified in areas such as
- the judicial power
- corruption
- the media
- the situation of civilians
This conflict, which has also heightened tensions between the Hungarian government and Vera Jourová, the competent (Czech) commissioner, promises to be one of the main themes of this week’s EU summit.
Justice Minister Judit Varga already tuned in to a Facebook post after a closed-door session was held in Luxembourg to discuss the rule of law.
Why are Western European champions of the rule of law and democracy afraid of the public? Why don’t you dare to publicly state your position on the famous European Commission report on the rule of law?
– asked the question, adding in hindsight, only Poland supported his proposal.
the #GAC meets today where I propose to hold a public debate on the @EU_Commission is #Paper Report. It is time for the Member States to show their commitment to transparency. Our citizens have the right to be informed.
– Judit Varga (@JuditVarga_EU) October 13, 2020
The Hungarian and his closest ally in the EU, the right-wing Polish government, find themselves side by side in an alliance of defense and defiance in Brussels.
For Varga, the stakes are not small: the Hungarian government could lose billions of euros if the leaders of the western member states toughen up under pressure from the EP, if the leaders of the western member states also toughen under PE pressure. Furthermore, not only the EU funding for the next seven years may depend on this problem, but also the revenue from the 750 billion recovery fund adopted in the summer to mitigate the effects of the coronavirus epidemic.
Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said that if the debate on the link between the rule of law and budget issues hinders the launch of the necessary financial fund due to the epidemic, an intergovernmental agreement outside the EU institutions is possible. According to portfolio.hu, if Hungary is left out of the fund created due to the crisis, it would mean a loss of 16,000 million euros.
Will we meet at court?
According to the paper form, the EU is not yet behind schedule. Currently, the ball is bouncing between the EU institutions.
The EP has now returned it to the council, so the Hungarian government is forced to sit at the negotiating table again.
Zoltán Gálik, an employee of the Corvinus University in Budapest, told the Index. According to the expert, this should start the negotiations almost from scratch, so it is not possible to say exactly what conditions the rule of law mechanism will impose on the support funds.
It can be anything, even a particularly harsh mechanism.
– says Zoltán Gálik, who says that it is also a question of how the exact procedure will be structured.
These are topics like that
- How will a violation be established?
- To what extent will the infringement lead to a sanction?
- Will the Court of Justice of the European Communities finally participate?
István Szent-Iványi considers the latter possibility probable. The foreign policy expert, former Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, former Member of the European Parliament in the SZDSZ, does not consider it possible for the negotiating parties to reach a consensus on the rule of law. As you said, these are fundamental issues like
- judicial independence
- freedom of the press
- fundamental democratic rights
But currently there are tensions between them, he argues, such as legality and legitimacy, the formal and substantive rule of law.
The Luxembourg-based EU court has already ruled this year in specific cases between the Orbán government and Brussels, such as
The verdict was convicting in both cases.
(Top image: Judit Varga, Minister of Justice, attending the meeting of EU Affairs Ministers of the EU Member States in Luxembourg on October 13, 2020.
MTI / EPA / Pool / Virginia Mayo)
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