{"id":248888,"date":"2025-07-08T20:22:09","date_gmt":"2025-07-08T20:22:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/248888\/"},"modified":"2025-07-08T20:22:09","modified_gmt":"2025-07-08T20:22:09","slug":"hungarys-failure-to-tackle-high-level-corruption-a-concern-eu-report-says-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/248888\/","title":{"rendered":"Hungary\u2019s failure to tackle high-level corruption a concern, EU report says \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

A continued failure by Hungary<\/a> to tackle cases of high-level corruption remains a \u201cconcern\u201d for the European Union<\/a>, a new report has said. <\/p>\n

Hungary\u2019s far-right government, led by populist prime minister Viktor Orban<\/a>, was criticised for overseeing a \u201cdeteriorating environment\u201d for civil-society organisations in the central European country.<\/p>\n

A report assessing the rule of law across the EU said judges in Hungary faced \u201cundue pressure\u201d and people believed there was a high level of corruption in the public sector. <\/p>\n

EU commissioner for justice Michael McGrath<\/a> said it was \u201cdeeply disappointing\u201d that the situation in Hungary had not improved over the last year. <\/p>\n

The recent attempt to ban the LGBT+ Pride parade in Budapest<\/a> was a further example that Hungary had slipped backwards, he said. <\/p>\n

The EU\u2019s annual rule of law report said the number of people convicted in Hungary over corruption charges had decreased, though the number of initial indictments remained high. <\/p>\n

The risk of \u201cpolitical influence and undue interference\u201d on police investigators and prosecutors was worrying, the report said. <\/p>\n

The lack of investigations into alleged corruption by high-ranking Hungarian officials and those in their close circles \u201cremain areas of concern\u201d, the report said. It also raised fears about \u201cclientelism, favouritism and nepotism\u201d in the Hungarian public administration. <\/p>\n

Ongoing concerns about the government undermining the rule of law and civil society has led to \u20ac18 billion of EU funding due to Hungary being frozen by the European Commission<\/a>, the union\u2019s executive arm that proposes and enforces EU laws. <\/p>\n

\u201cConcerns related to the absence of procedural safeguards and effective oversight in case of secret surveillance measures outside criminal proceedings have not been addressed,\u201d the report said. <\/p>\n

The commission\u2019s report criticised prime minister Robert Fico<\/a>\u2019s populist government in Slovakia<\/a> for putting further pressure on civil-society groups and making it more difficult for independent journalists to work. <\/p>\n

There had been no progress made to improve the investigation and prosecution of cases involving high-level corruption, the report said. The power of a prosecutor general in Slovakia to annul the final decisions of lower-level prosecutors was concerning, it added.<\/p>\n

Speaking in Strasbourg, Mr McGrath said work to improve the rule of law had picked \u201cthe low-hanging fruit\u201d over recent years. Progress national capitals were being asked to make on other recommendations for \u201cdeeper, more structural\u201d reforms would take longer. <\/p>\n

The EU report said large publicly-funded contracts and infrastructure projects were sectors vulnerable to corruption in Spain. It noted that a previous survey had found many companies felt corruption had prevented them from winning public contracts in the last three years. <\/p>\n

There had been \u201climited progress\u201d bringing in comprehensive rules governing political lobbying in Italy, the report said. There were similar shortcomings in Bulgaria\u2019s effort to ensure a higher standard of integrity across government. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A continued failure by Hungary to tackle cases of high-level corruption remains a \u201cconcern\u201d for the European Union,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":248889,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5174],"tags":[2000,299,5187,1699,2190,6566,2558,1781],"class_list":{"0":"post-248888","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-european-union","12":"tag-hungary","13":"tag-robert-fico","14":"tag-slovakia","15":"tag-viktor-orban"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114819481251288643","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248888","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=248888"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248888\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/248889"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=248888"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=248888"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=248888"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}