The European Commission and Hungary are close to reaching an agreement on the release of €13 million in EU cohesion policy funds, a European source confirmed on Friday 28 April.
These funds are part of an envelope of €21.5 billion in EU cohesion funding currently frozen by the Commission due to concerns about the independence of judges and the country’s failure to comply with the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights (LGBTQ rights, academic freedom and asylum).
“If the case of the independence of the judiciary is settled, the vast majority of cohesion programmes will be unblocked”, said European Commissioner for Budget Johannes Hahn in an interview with journalists on Thursday 27 April.
Hungary will have to adopt additional corrective measures to release the remaining funds.
Commission officials recently reached a technical agreement with Viktor Orbán’s government on amendments to strengthen the independence of the judiciary. The Commission still has to approve the changes to Hungary’s laws once they are approved by the country’s parliament.
Thus, if the Commission gives the green light, this would unlock all cohesion policy funds, in principle, except for funds frozen in the context of the Regulation which makes the payment of EU funds conditional on the respect of the Rule of law, explains a source close to the dossier.
The EU Council adopted in December 2022 a decision suspending €6.3 billion of EU cohesion policy funds to Hungary due to the violation of the Rule of law in the country (see EUROPE 13084/19).
Mr Hahn will meet Viktor Orbán on Tuesday 2 May in Budapest, where he is expected to discuss these issues. He is visiting the country as part of his tour of the 27 Member States to discuss the mid-term review of the Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF) 2021-2027.
Furthermore, Mr Hahn warned that if Budapest did not submit changes to the law by early May to resolve the conflict of interest surrounding the Hungarian public foundations that run the universities, it could lose access to Erasmus benefits starting from the next academic year. (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur and Pauline Denys)