“The European Union is financing political activists to interfere in the domestic affairs of member states and to launch attacks against governments that are critical of Brussels and its migration policy, gender ideology or warmongering rhetoric,” Tamás Deutsch, Member of the European Parliament for the governing Hungarian Fidesz party told The European Conservative.
His reaction comes after a recently published article by Hungarian conservative daily Magyar Nemzet revealed that millions of euros of EU funds have been awarded to organisations critical of the conservative Hungarian government, and roughly two-thirds of that money is going to groups linked to Hungarian-born U.S. billionaire George Soros. Some of the funding comes from the European Commission’s Citizens, Equality, Rights and Values programme (CERV) which aims “to protect and promote Union rights and values as enshrined in the EU Treaties and the Charter of Fundamental Rights. It will contribute to sustain and further develop open, rights-based, democratic, equal and inclusive societies based on the rule of law.”
Funds are distributed to all EU members, and the largest Hungarian benefactor in the 2021-27 legislation period was the Ökotárs Alapítvány (Hungarian Environmental Partnership Foundation), which received a whopping €3.4 million “to enable them to be better prepared to protect and promote Union values, including democracy, rule of law and human rights”.
Two other anti-government groups, Magyar Helsinki Bizottság (Hungarian Helsinki Committee) and Társaság a Szabadságjogokért (Hungarian Civil Liberties Union) were awarded €119,000 and €68,000 respectively with the main aim of multiplying the number of Hungarian lawyers “equipped and motivated to bring forward domestic and European strategic litigation based on the EU Charter [of Fundamental Rights]”.
LGBTQ advocacy group Háttér Társaság (Háttér Society) got €73,000 for—among other things—“decreasing discrimination against LGBTQI people in the field of education, healthcare, social services and psychological support”.
Meanwhile, one of the largest organisations representing Hungarian Jews, Magyarországi Zsidó Hitközségek Szövetsége received €74,000. One of their goals will be “to decrease the existing, significant knowledge deficit in Hungarian and other societies regarding the facts of the Holocaust and thus to fight Holocaust denial and distortion.”
According to conservative news channel Hír TV, Hungarian media linked to George Soros have also been instrumental in launching a smear campaign against Csaba Böjte, an ethnic Hungarian Franciscan monk, founder of the Saint Francis Foundation in Transylvania, Romania, that has provided food, housing, and education to hundreds of children living in poor conditions. Left-liberal publications Mérce and Átlátszó Erdély received €14,000 from Journalism Fund, an organisation backed by Open Society Foundations, to write stories about an alleged “pedophile scandal” in one of the orphanages.
Other Hungarian groups that have benefited from other EU programmes were Amnesty International Hungary and leftist think-tanks Republikon Intézet and Political Capital, among many others.
The funds come as no surprise, as EU institutions and Western liberal governments regularly criticise Hungary for not adhering to European “values” and rule of law standards. The Viktor Orbán-led Fidesz party—which has been in power since 2010—insists that the attacks are ideology-based, and the liberals are punishing Hungary for not adopting Western ideals on mass migration and LGBTQ issues, and not aligning with the rest of the EU with regards to sending weapons to help invaded Ukraine. Western politicians also regularly accuse the government and Hungarians of being antisemitic, even though studies—like the one by Tel Aviv University last year—regularly find Hungary to be one of the safest European countries for Jews.
Magyar Nemzet notes that while the EU is happy to spend money on organisations critical of the Hungarian government, Hungary is the only other EU member state alongside Poland that still hasn’t received the pandemic recovery funds from the European Commission.
Despite George Soros’s Open Society Foundations (OSF) vowing to significantly decrease its operation in EU countries, communications director of Fidesz István Hollik told public broadcaster Kossuth Rádió on Sunday, September 10th that the “Soros network” “wants to continue being active in Eastern Europe”, and given their good relations with the “Brussels bureaucrats”, they have managed to get Brussels to finance “these attempts of interference”. Referring to next year’s European Parliament elections, the politician said: “The reality is that Brussels is pre-financing the Hungarian Left’s campaign.”
With regards to the recovery funds being withheld, Tamás Deutsch said:
They talk about withholding EU funds from countries that are violating fundamental European values, when in fact the Brussels bureaucracy is abusing its power to pursue its own political agenda, blackmailing and exerting pressure on states and governments whose steps it doesn’t agree with.
The Fidesz politician added:
EU taxpayers’ money is being used to finance political activists that are taking action against democratically elected governments. It’s simply astonishing.
