PM Orban: Hungary's EU Presidency to Focus on Peace

Viktor Orban emphasized peace and competitiveness as the core goals of Hungary's EU presidency in an exclusive interview.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban in an interview for M1 news channel taking place in Brussels on July 1, 2024. (Photo: MTI/PM's Press Office/Zoltan Fischer)

Peace will be at the focus of Hungary's EU presidency, Viktor Orban stressed in an exclusive interview with M1 news channel. The prime minister added that another important objective will be to strengthen competitiveness.

Hungary takes over the baton from Belgium

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban took over the rotating presidency from the cartaker Belgian prime minister.  "We are taking over the presidency now, but our cooperation started earlier, with three countries working together. Spain, Belgium and us, this is how we come one after the other. We are taking over the work and the dossiers from each other, so I can say that the Belgian prime minister has done a good job. It's a pity that he lost the elections, but this is our profession, if people do not trust their leader, then this is the end of it, Viktor Orban told M1 news channel in the interview.

His situation is completely different, he noted.

We got 45 percent of the vote, the highest in Europe, and we beat the second by 15 percent, defeating both the old and new opposition at the same time. So we rightly feel that trust in the government has been reaffirmed, and we can start the work of the presidency with this resource, impetus and sense of security,

he highlighted.

1,500 working group meetings

During Hungary's presidency, "we will hold around 1,500 working group meetings, 230 presidency events and 37 high-level meetings, while the summits of the 27 European prime ministers and the meeting of the European Political Community consisting of 47 European heads of state and government will also be held in Budapest. We have 260 people working in Brussels, a thousand people working in Budapest during the presidency, and there are 120 legislative dossiers that need to be pushed forward and taken forward. This is the work that we have ahead of us,” Viktor Orban said.

He is even more optimistic now than after the election, he added.

The reason for my optimism after the election was that people across Europe voted for change. We are talking about 27 countries, and in 20 of those 27 countries, parties that said enough is enough won. Things cannot go on like this in Brussels, change is needed. That's why the Belgian prime minister failed, that's why the French government failed, and it was a close shave in Germany, too. So the primary source of our optimism is that people want change,

he said.

Brussels bureaucrats want no change

However,  the bureaucrats in Brussels think differently and do not want change, he said, pointing out 

this adds to our optimism, because the fact that we need change becomes even more obvious. And the more evident is the fact that there is a need for change, the more likely change is going to take place. This is why we have launched a new European party alliance, which will grow at an incredible pace, and it will swiftly become the third and then the second largest parliamentary group in Brussels.

The reason for this, he said, "'is quite simply that Brussels could not accept the discontent, did not adapt to it, did not listen to the people, but rejected the people's decision, and concluded a pact on the distribution of power, with the sole aim of dominating political positions here in Brussels for another five years, but this will not work, because you cannot govern against the will of people".

This strengthens those of us, who want change, even more, adds to our strength, and we will achieve this change here. If not in two weeks, then in two months,

he stated.

Manfred Weber would have been a disaster

Speaking about the fact that five years ago Hungary supported the nomination of Ursula von der Leyen as president of the European Commission, and now it does not, Viktor Orban recalled that five years ago the European People's Party nominated Manfred Weber as commission president.

This would have been a disaster for Hungary. Ursula von der Leyen's presidency will not be recorded in golden letters in the Hungarian history books, but much worse would have come with Manfred Weber, who is known to be anti-Hungarian, a man who is  distinctly Hungarophobic. So we had to prevent his becoming commission president,

PM Orban said. 

Manfred Weber uttered a sentence that we remember and gave us reason to do this, when he said that he did not want to become commission president with the vote of the Hungarian people, PM Orban explained. 

"He didn't want it, not with the Hungarian government's vote, not with mine, but with the Hungarian people's vote. He attacked the whole country, there is no such thing. You can insult the prime minister, though it's not nice, and your negotiating partner, that's not nice either, but passes. But you can't insult a country, you can't look down on it. A country will stand up for itself, and I stood up for Hungary, and we were heard, and he didn't become commission president," Viktor Orban said, noting that Ursula von der Leyen was found to be a better candidate in this situation.

"I still hold this view, despite the fact that over the past five years, the president's performance, especially regarding the issue of war and migration, and perhaps the green transition, the Green Deal, has been rather modest," he said, adding that "this is why we wanted to find a more capable and more suitable leader to head the commission, and this is why I couldn't support her".

Political attacks under the guise of the rule of law

"Not to mention the unfair decisions she has sometimes taken against Hungary. The commission has launched political attacks on Hungary under the guise of the rule of law, and this, of course, cannot be ignored. All this entails consequences, and we cannot support her renewed mandate as commission president," PM Orban said.

"In a few more days, many people will be surprised"

As also reported by Magyar Nemzet, a new political alliance called Patriots for Europe has been launched in Vienna, in cooperation with the chairman of the Freedom Party of Austria and former Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis. The Portuguese Chega party has already joined the political formation. In this context, Viktor Orban highlighted,"we love our country, this is the starting point. Moreover, we passionately love our country. This is called patriotic feeling. It is also called nationalism. There are two types, one good and one bad. Those who love their country while trampling others underfoot and love their own country against others are usually seen as chauvinists and bad nationalists. But there are those who love their country for itself. Not against others, but because of the culture, language, achievement, land, geography, family, history, our cemeteries, our churches, our children, our future, that's what we love. This is not against anyone. And we do not want a Europe that takes away and obliterates everything, turning grey everything that is important to us patriots.  Well, these people, people with this kind of mindset, have gathered, or are starting to gather, under the banner that the three of us, the presidents of the largest Austrian party, the largest Czech party and the largest Hungarian party, raised in Vienna on Sunday. And they are gathering under the banner".

We will become a large parliamentary group faster than anyone would think now. In 4 or 5 more days, many people will be surprised,

the Viktor Orban emphasized, adding that 

their inaugural meeting will be held on July 8.

The new party alliance is made up of  "those who want to improve Europe. So we are patriots for Europe, as our name says. So we are patriots who passionately love their own countries and believe that Europe is important at the same time," he said.

We want strong European cooperation not against Europe, but in the interest of our own countries. We don't want a European empire, a United States of Europe, a grey mass controlled from Brussels and a totalitarian regime. We want national sovereignty and independence under our own national flags,

he highlighted.

"The European people want peace, but something has gone wrong, and instead they are receiving war because we failed to prevent the Russia-Ukraine war, and when it broke out we couldn't isolate the conflict. We want order and security. Instead, European people are facing migration and the resulting threat of terrorism and crime. We perceive this less in Hungary, except through news reports, as there are no migrants in Hungary, because we do not let them in. But those who are still and have been allowing them in are suffering. They have to grapple with a thousand problems from this new situation in which they have to live with millions of migrants from a foreign culture", the PM explained, adding that those who are now gathering under the banner do not want this.

"What the people of Europe also want is development, economic growth, more wages, better jobs, better and more secure lives, and more promising prospects in terms of their livelihoods. Instead, they are now getting stagnation. An economic analysis published today that I was reading on the flight here says that in 2008, the economies of the United States and the European Union were roughly the same size. Today, the US's is twice that of the European Union. Average incomes in Europe are 27% lower than in the US and average salaries are 37% lower in Europe than in the United States. And the value of firms is just barely growing, or rather stagnating and often dropping here, while it is growing in the US. So the prospects are present there rather than here," Mr Orban said, adding that this shows that the European economy is in a rut. The situation has arisen from a number of reasons, including bad decisions by the Commission and its head.

So, if you are asking where to place this new alliance, it is to be placed on the side of peace, order and development,

he underlined.

"Ideologically, we are patriotic, which in European culture means right-wing. A patriot is a right-winger, left-wingers are internationalists," the Hungarian leader added.

It is impossible to say whether one of Europe's regions will be a dominant force in the alliance, Mr Orban said. After all, he pointed out, the Czechs, Austrians and Hungarians have already been joined by the Portuguese, and

and the Italians will soon be on board. 

"I know who else will be joining in the next few days."

It's going to be a pan-European party, which started in Central Europe but also gathers Western European parties around it, so we're talking about a pan-European political organization,

he stressed.

Make Europe great again!

The motto of the Hungarian presidency is "Make Europe great again". Mr Orban noted that "if the United States is endeavoring to make itself great, and Europe is talking about how we want to remain a player in world politics, and even stop the current decline and the fading of our strength, and become strong again, then we must also become great". 

How can we compete with an America that is making itself great if we are not becoming great ourselves?

he asked. Of course, the Americans cannot be left out when thinking about the future of Europe, he admitted.

In the US presidential debate the conservative or Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump made it clear that he would end the war in Ukraine within 24 hours.

So, if he wins, there will at least be a ceasefire. Whether that will lead to a lasting peace is a question for the future, but what we have now will certainty not continue, that's for sure. And Europe must therefore prepare itself and quickly, for the situation that sooner or later the Americans and the Russians will negotiate with each other, Mr Orban pointed out.

The most important question of the coming period, in the PM's view, is where Europe will fit into this scenario, whether we will participate, who will represent our interests, and what precisely our interests are.

He added that what Hungary and the Hungarian presidency, can do is put proposals on the table. 

"So we don't decide, but help the 27 prime ministers decide. We will be there in all the places that are important for Europe, we will explore all the situations, prepare reports on them for the European leaders to discuss in the Council and for the big European leaders to make decisions. I can facilitate having decisions on these issues and at least tingget these issues on the table," he said.

"What we, as Hungarians, can add to the European debates - stemming from our Hungarian character - is that we will call a spade a spade, because we have learned that we live in a corner of the world where if we do not call things by their name, or make decisions in time, our country will fall."

The Hungarian presidency will be good for Europe 

So the Hungarian Presidency will be good for Europe because we will be very open about the most difficult issues without trying to influence decision-makers, and we will give our views on a situation in the form of candid, straightforward studies. So we will not have the problem - so common here in Brussels - of matters being presented in a biased, difficult-to-understand jargon, in the Brussels bubble's own bureaucratic approach and with much time being wasted, or in the end not even being put on the table at all," the PM stressed, adding that "I believe that we can give impetus to the whole European Union without losing sight of scale".

"It is important that everyone knows their place in the world. We Hungarians also have our place, we have our virtues and our faults, our weight, our abilities and disabilities. We are aware of roughly where we stand in the world and what are capabilities are, and we will do our best to add to Europe's values over the next six months. This is what can be expected from the Hungarian presidency. There will be some surprising things," he said.

One of the key objectives of the Hungarian presidency is to strengthen European competitiveness.

We want to conclude a major competitiveness agreement,

he underlined.

"I think it was a mistake to introduce big international taxes, taxes are bad things. If you want to stimulate the economy, you should not impose taxes, you should support the players in the economy. Measures are being introduced or are on the agenda already, which we would like to revise. They are allegedly about protecting certain industries, particularly the auto industry, from the East, but in the run-up to the presidency, I have been talking to the heads of the big car manufacturers and they say they don't want these measures at all because when the East hits back, the manufacturers will lose a lot more than if we hadn't started this," he explained. He also stressed, 

the European Union is now on the brink of getting into a trade war with the East, which we will only lose out on. So what is needed is not isolationism, but rather a strengthening of our relations and more vigorous trade.

"And then there is this problem of the green transition, where policies have been implemented in recent years which have resulted in us using more coal today than we did before the whole green transition. But the aim of the green transition was to eliminate everything harmful and damaging from the point of view of air pollution and climate. And the rules, the bad rules that have been made here, especially by the Commission and its president, have led to the fact that we are using more coal in Europe today than we did before the great green transition, and energy prices have risen by a factor of two or three. The reason why we cannot compete with Chinq and the US is that energy prices in all those countries are much lower than in our own", Mr Orban stressed, adding:

We at least can still protect Hungarians somewhat with our utility caps, but people in every other country in Europe are paying and suffering more, and companies are suffering as well. That is why the whole green energy policy needs to be radically rethought and reformulated.

"At the same time, from the Hungarian perspective the greatest opportunity in this six-month presidency is to bring our continent closer to peace," Mr Orban said.

Cover photo: Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban in an interview for M1 news channel taking place in Brussels on July 1, 2024. (Photo: MTI/PM's Press Office/Zoltan Fischer)