Hungary, which has become a hybrid regime of electoral autocracy, can no longer be considered a democracy like any other. This is the message that MEPs passed by a wide margin on Thursday 15 September in Strasbourg, adopting by 433 votes to 123 with 28 abstentions the interim report on the so-called ‘Article 7’ procedure against Hungary, tabled by the French MEP Gwendoline Delbos-Corfield (Greens/EFA).
For the Greens/EFA MEP, the Hungarian ‘case’ poses a real democratic problem, as the European Parliament assumes that the 27 Member States taking decisions in the EU Council are “27 democratic states”. The fact that Hungary is no longer a fully functioning democracy may affect the “common decisions” taken by the EU Council, “which concern us all”, she had explained on 14 September during a plenary debate with the Commissioner for Justice, Didier Reynders.
“How can the Council of the EU continue to deliberate like this on a daily basis?”, she asked, aware however that the Parliament “has reached the end of its work” and does not have many tools left.
The resolution adopted on Wednesday does not differ much from the one adopted in the Committee on Civil Liberties in July (see EUROPE 12992/2), when MEPs had already denounced a “hybrid regime of electoral autocracy”, but it updates the European Parliament’s main messages, including Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s recent comments on his rejection of a “mixed race” for the Hungarian population.
The resolution, which is not binding, also comes in the context of recent challenges to abortion rights, with new requirements for women seeking abortions.
The report deplores the worsening of the situation of fundamental rights, but also of judicial independence, academic freedom or the situation of the media since 2018, when the European Parliament had triggered this Article 7 of the Treaty.
Scandals, such as eavesdropping via the Pegasus software, have since been added to the list of concerns and “even women are now enemies”, added the French MEP.
In its resolution, the European Parliament also continues to criticise the inaction of the EU Council and its inability to achieve significant improvements and contain the attacks on democracy.
MEPs also call on the Commission to use all the means at its disposal and, in particular, the budgetary conditionality mechanism, as a decision to this effect could be adopted on 18 September.
They call as well on the Commission to postpone the approval of Hungary’s recovery plan until the country complies with the recommendations of the ‘European Semester’ and implements the decisions of the Court of Justice of the EU and the European Court of Human Rights to exclude from funding cohesion programmes that contribute to the misuse of EU funds or participate in violations of the Rule of law, and to apply the Common Provisions Regulation and the Financial Regulation more strictly in order to avoid any use of EU funds for political purposes.
The Hungarian government “denies the problems” and hides behind the fact that other member countries have problems with the Rule of law. “But these countries agree that things need to be improved, whereas in Hungary, the problems are systemic”, said Isabel Wiseler-Lima (EPP, Luxembourger), arguing that “deviations from the Rule of law have increased”.
“With each report the situation worsens”, also denounced MEP Paulo Rangel (EPP, Portuguese).
The German MEP, Daniel Freund (Greens/EFA) said there was an urgent need to act and to deprive the country of funds, which had still received “€30 billion since 2018”, of which “eight billion were misused”. Hungary “is no longer a democracy, no longer respects the values to which all Member States have subscribed” and is an “existential threat to the EU”, the German added.
Link to the adopted report: https://aeur.eu/f/33z (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)