{"id":142063,"date":"2025-05-29T18:26:10","date_gmt":"2025-05-29T18:26:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/142063\/"},"modified":"2025-05-29T18:26:10","modified_gmt":"2025-05-29T18:26:10","slug":"20-eu-countries-urge-sanctions-on-hungary-over-the-countrys-extreme-anti-lgbtq-laws","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/142063\/","title":{"rendered":"20 EU Countries Urge Sanctions on Hungary Over the Country\u2019s Extreme Anti-LGBTQ+ Laws"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sign up for The Agenda<\/a> \u2014 Them\u2019s news and politics newsletter, delivered to your inbox every Thursday.<\/strong><\/p>\n

A coalition of 20 European Union countries has signed a statement denouncing new anti-LGBTQ+ laws in Hungary, accusing Prime Minister Viktor Orb\u00e1n of violating EU human rights law by banning LGBTQ+ public gatherings \u2014 including this year\u2019s Budapest Pride.<\/p>\n

Representatives from the 20 countries released the joint statement<\/a> on Tuesday this week, coinciding with the start of a meeting of the EU\u2019s General Affairs Council. The statement centered on condemning a Hungarian law and constitutional amendment, both of which were fast-tracked through the legislature earlier this year. Together, the new laws ban LGBTQ+ public events<\/a> which \u201cportray\u201d or \u201cpromote […] gender identity different from sex at birth,\u201d as defined in Hungary\u2019s 2021 anti-LGBTQ+ \u201cpropaganda\u201d law<\/a> \u2014 including events like Budapest Pride, which is still scheduled to take place June 28. The laws also allow Hungarian authorities to use facial recognition programs<\/a> to search for \u2014 and prosecute \u2014 attendees and organizers of such banned events. (Several European watchdog groups have said that the facial recognition portion on its own violates EU regulations<\/a>.)<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are concerned by the implications of these measures on freedom of expression, the right to peaceful assembly, and the right to privacy,\u201d the statement read in part, adding that the Hungarian laws \u201crun contrary to the fundamental values of human dignity, freedom, equality and respect for human rights\u201d as laid out in Article 2 of the Treaty on European Union<\/a>. As of Thursday, the statement had been signed by representatives from Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Czechia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain, and Sweden.<\/p>\n

\u201cRespecting and protecting the human rights and fundamental freedoms of all people, including LGBTIQ+ persons, is inherent in being part of the European family. This is our responsibility and shared commitment of the member states and the European institutions,\u201d the statement continued. \u201cWe therefore call upon Hungary to revise these measures, to ensure the human rights and fundamental freedoms of all its citizens are respected and protected, thus complying with its international obligations.\u201d<\/p>\n

Signees also asked the European Commission \u2014 the EU\u2019s executive body \u2014 to \u201cexpeditiously make full use of the rule of law toolbox at its disposal in case these measures are not revised accordingly.\u201d But EU ministers still lack the majority needed to impose sanctions on Hungary under a process that has been underway since 2018, one diplomat told Euronews<\/a> this week. During the General Affairs Council meeting, ministers held the eighth hearing in seven years<\/a> regarding Hungary\u2019s \u201cclear risk of a serious breach\u201d of Article 2\u2019s human rights conventions on several fronts, including \u201cthe protection of LGBTQI rights.\u201d<\/p>\n

Under Orb\u00e1n\u2019s government, Hungary has harshly clamped down on LGBTQ+ expression<\/a> under the guise of \u201cprotecting\u201d children<\/a> \u2014 a tactic matching other conservative regimes like Russia\u2019s Vladimir Putin<\/a> and the United States\u2019 Republican Party<\/a>, which has recently reinvigorated the AIDS crisis<\/a> by denying foreign aid specifically for LGBTQ+ people. Hungary is also a frequent impediment to EU foreign policy<\/a>, leading some to call for its EU voting rights to be suspended<\/a> \u2014 a move which ministers reportedly considered this week<\/a>. But some EU officials are still hesitant; European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen\u2019s office reportedly advised her commissioners not to attend Budapest Pride in Hungary next month, to avoid \u201cprovoking Viktor Orb\u00e1n on his own turf,\u201d a source told Euractiv<\/a> this week.<\/p>\n

Police ordered organizers to cancel a planned June 1 protest march in Budapest, which was intended to call for LGBTQ+ rights and call attention to the country\u2019s ban on legal recognition of trans people<\/a>, members of the Hungarian LGBTQ+ rights group H\u00e1tt\u00e9r T\u00e1rsas\u00e1g<\/a> wrote in a statement on Monday.<\/p>\n

\u201cSuch blatant arbitrariness on the part of the authorities endangers us all, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity, as from now on, any community or opinion that is inconvenient for the government can be banned on the grounds of \u2018child protection\u2019 \u2014 without any legal or scientific basis,\u201d the group\u2019s statement (translated from Hungarian) read in part. Budapest Pride 2025, they added, \u201cmust be bigger than ever.\u201d<\/p>\n

Get the best of what\u2019s queer.<\/strong> Sign up for Them\u2019s weekly newsletter here.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sign up for The Agenda \u2014 Them\u2019s news and politics newsletter, delivered to your inbox every Thursday. A…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":142064,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5174],"tags":[2000,299,5187,8526],"class_list":{"0":"post-142063","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-eu","8":"tag-eu","9":"tag-europe","10":"tag-european","11":"tag-lgbtq-rights"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114592532587556550","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/142063","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=142063"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/142063\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/142064"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=142063"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=142063"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=142063"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}