BRUSSELS – Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán tried to move closer to a deal with the European Commission yesterday so he can revive stalled international aid talks. He is trying to rework laws that critics say undermine democracy.
But Mr Orbán’s deputy tempered expectations of an agreement and revealed a potential point of conflict between Budapest and the commission, which has threatened legal action if Hungary does not change laws on the central bank, courts and data protection.
European Union finance ministers also opened the way for the bloc to freeze cohesion funds to Budapest, saying unorthodox decisions that Mr Orbán has used to cut the budget deficit had not brought it below the bloc’s ceiling in a sustainable way.
Mr Orbán’s efforts to centralise power and stack Hungarian state bodies with party loyalists have drawn criticism from Brussels and Washington, which fear they stifle democratic freedoms in the ex-communist country of 10 million. He has lost much of his support at home, while the economy is heading for recession and investors’ loss of confidence has pushed borrowing costs to above 9 per cent. Analysts say Mr Orbán needs an aid deal to maintain access to the markets.
He was to meet commission president José Manuel Barroso to present a timetable for legal changes. However, deputy prime minister Tibor Navracsics said the aim of the meeting was not necessarily to clinch a deal that would give a green light for aid talks with the EU and IMF to resume.
“I do not know if either the prime minister or the president of the commission have the ambition to strike an agreement today. The issues at stake are just not that pressing,” he said. – (Reuters)