Former Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orb\u00e1n made his first official trip abroad since Fidesz lost power in April, travelling to Brussels on Wednesday, 17 June, ahead of a summit of the Patriots for Europe (PfE) group, where he argued that the rise of Europe\u2019s patriotic forces would continue despite his party\u2019s electoral defeat.<\/p>\n
Speaking at an international press conference alongside former EU Affairs Minister J\u00e1nos B\u00f3ka, Orb\u00e1n insisted that Fidesz\u2019s loss did not alter what he described as the \u2018historic\u2019 and \u2018almost deterministic\u2019 advance of patriotic movements across Europe.<\/p>\n
\u2018Our election defeat does not change the fact that patriotic forces are advancing across Europe. No single election defeat can change that,\u2019 Orb\u00e1n said. He added that Fidesz would remain committed to supporting the European patriotic movement and reiterated his long-standing call for reform of the European Union.<\/p>\n
The press conference took place on the eve of a Patriots for Europe<\/a> leaders\u2019 meeting in Brussels. The gathering brings together the leaders of the alliance\u2019s member parties to coordinate their positions ahead of the European Council summit on 18\u201319 June. Discussions are expected to focus on migration, competitiveness, energy prices, the EU\u2019s long-term budget, and the war in Ukraine.<\/p>\n \u2018Our election defeat does not change the fact that patriotic forces are advancing across Europe\u2019<\/p>\n Co-founded<\/a> by Orb\u00e1n, Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babi\u0161, and Austrian Freedom Party leader Herbert Kickl in June 2024, PfE has increasingly sought to present itself as a unified sovereigntist alternative to the traditional Brussels establishment while maintaining flexibility on issues where national interests differ.<\/p>\n Orb\u00e1n argued that the European Union was performing poorly in several key areas, including competitiveness, energy security, migration, and the handling of the Russo\u2013Ukrainian war. Reflecting on his own time in office, he described it as one of his \u2018intellectual failures\u2019 that his government had not found an economic model capable of shielding Hungary from broader European economic difficulties after 2022.<\/p>\n The former prime minister stressed that Fidesz\u2019s electoral defeat would not change PfE\u2019s objectives. According to Orb\u00e1n, the alliance would continue to strengthen its influence across the continent and would remain represented at the highest level of EU decision-making through Prime Minister Babi\u0161. He said Babi\u0161 would represent the patriotic camp\u2019s interests during discussions among EU leaders.<\/p>\n On migration, Orb\u00e1n reiterated Fidesz\u2019s long-standing opposition to EU migration policies. He claimed Hungary had no migration problem because there were no illegal migrants in the country and again argued that asylum applications should be processed outside EU territory rather than within member states.<\/p>\n Orb\u00e1n also praised the growing cooperation between centre-right and right-wing forces in the European Parliament, pointing to the recent adoption of tougher EU deportation rules<\/a> as evidence that conservative parties could successfully challenge the left on migration policy. He argued that the future required \u2018greater unity\u2019 among right-wing parties and warned against continued cooperation between centre-right parties and the left.<\/p>\n Addressing domestic issues, Orb\u00e1n criticized the new government led by Prime Minister P\u00e9ter Magyar, accusing it of yielding to EU pressure in an attempt to unlock previously frozen EU funds<\/a>. He nevertheless stressed that securing all available EU funding remained a national interest and argued that Hungary should continue fighting for funds withheld due to his administration\u2019s disputes with the European Commission.<\/p>\n Discussing Ukraine, Orb\u00e1n claimed that the new Hungarian government had conceded to Brussels and Kyiv on several issues. He reiterated his opposition to Ukraine\u2019s EU accession process, arguing that opening membership negotiations was a mistake, while expressing hope that Kyiv would honour agreements concerning the rights of the Hungarian minority in Transcarpathia reached under the new Tisza government.<\/p>\n \u2018Orb\u00e1n also praised the growing cooperation between centre-right and right-wing forces in the European Parliament\u2019<\/p>\n Asked whether Fidesz\u2019s defeat had been caused by an excessively pro-Russian image, Orb\u00e1n rejected the suggestion. \u2018No pro-Russian party ran in the Hungarian election,\u2019 he said, insisting that Fidesz had always pursued a \u2018pro-Hungarian\u2019 foreign policy and would continue to do so.<\/p>\n Orb\u00e1n also dismissed speculation that he was planning to relocate to the United States following his electoral defeat. When asked about a recently adopted constitutional amendment preventing him from returning as prime minister, he responded jokingly that he had \u2018got off cheaply\u2019 by receiving only a constitutional ban<\/a>.<\/p>\n Turning to domestic politics, Orb\u00e1n dismissed the corruption and abuse-of-power allegations that dominated public discourse during the final months of the election campaign and have continued to feature prominently since the new government took office. He argued that many of the accusations would eventually prove to be politically motivated and without substance, claiming that \u2018the balloons are bursting one after another\u2019 following the election.<\/p>\n Related articles:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orb\u00e1n made his first official trip abroad since Fidesz lost power in April,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":22223,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5],"tags":[18,80,7582,1194,5288,277,125,4876,996,13672,5696,938,13673,13674,6712,3276,13675,1043,88,57,943],"class_list":["post-22222","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-brussels","tag-brussels","tag-competitiveness","tag-conservative","tag-eu-accession","tag-eu-funding","tag-european-commission","tag-european-union","tag-fidesz","tag-migration","tag-minority-rights","tag-patriots-for-europe","tag-peter-magyar","tag-pfe","tag-pro-russian","tag-right-wing","tag-russo-ukrainian-war","tag-sovereigntist","tag-tisza-party","tag-ukraine","tag-viktor-orban","tag-war-in-ukraine"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@be\/116771987255588733","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22222","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22222"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22222\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22223"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22222"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22222"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22222"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}