Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán called the announcement by the Brussels body a disgrace.Continue reading
A prominent Hungarian political analyst has called the European Commission’s withholding of EU funds from Hungary and Poland ‘political pressure.’
Zoltán Kiszelly, director of the Századvég Center for Policy Analysis, commented on the European Commission’s withholding of cohesion funds from Poland in an interview with the M1 public service channel.
“It is a clear political pressure that the European Commission is withholding EU funds to Poland,”
the political scientist stressed. “The aim is to bring down the right-wing sovereignist government from Brussels and replace it with a pro-Brussels government by driving a wedge between the smaller and larger governing parties,” he pointed out. “Brussels is trying to force the Polish government to withdraw the proposals of Justice Minister Zbigniew Ziobro, the leader of one of the smaller governing coalition parties, during the judicial reform, hoping that this will lead to the break-up of the governing coalition,” Kiszelly explained.
According to the analyst, the decision could also be motivated by the Polish government’s plans to spend 110 billion euros on arms and the expansion of the Polish army. If this happened, the Polish army would be much stronger than the German one. “So in Berlin and Brussels they may also think that if the Poles do not get the EU money, they will not be able to create one of the biggest armies in Europe,” he said.
Kiszelly was also asked about the fact that not only the Polish but also the Hungarian government has not yet received all the EU funds to which the countries are entitled. “The money that Hungary and Poland are due from the recovery fund has already been claimed by the French, the Italians, the Spanish, and the Portuguese, who are in debt and therefore finding it very difficult to borrow,” he noted.
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