Strasbourg, 09/04/2002 (Agence Europe) - The President of the EP Liberal group, Graham Watson, has welcomed the election setback for the far right Justice and Life Party in the Hungarian general elections on 7 April, which failed to win any seats. "The fact that Hungarians have turned away from extreme nationalism augurs well for their country's accession to the EU. I am also tremendously heartened by the performance of our liberal friends", he said, wishing them well for the second round.
The Co-President of the Greens/EFA group, Daniel Cohn-Bendit, said the results showed "that it does not pay off to play the nationalist card, as the Hungarian Prime Minister Victor Orban tried to do". The high electoral turnout (71%) also shows that the electorate "clearly rejected the poisoning of the political climate by the FIDESZ, which has fuelled antisemitism in Hungary and has antagonised neighbouring countries", but regretted that the Centrum Party only achieved a "respectable" 3.8%, and failed to break through the 5% threshold.