Sightseeing boat was by the Hungarian parliament building when it collided with another vessel
Seven South Koreans have died after a sightseeing boat sank in the Danube, close to the Hungarian parliament building in central Budapest, Hungarian and South Korean officials have said.
Thirty-three South Koreans were onboard the boat when it collided with another vessel, South Korea’s foreign ministry said. The 26-metre tourist boat was also carrying two Hungarian crew members.
Continue reading...Council of Europe’s damning report says human rights violations must be urgently addressed
Europe’s top human rights watchdog has accused Hungary’s government of violating people’s rights and using anti-migrant rhetoric that fuels “xenophobic attitudes, fear and hatred”.
A damning report from the Council of Europe’s commissioner for human rights, Dunja Mijatović, concluded: “Human rights violations in Hungary have a negative effect on the whole protection system and the rule of law” and should “be addressed as a matter of urgency”.
Continue reading...Trump welcomes Viktor Orbán to White House as Pompeo heads to meeting of EU nations in apparent attempt to soothe relations over Iran deal
Oh, the places you’ll go indeed, Rod Rosenstein.
After giving a commencement address and quoting Robert Mueller - you know, the man whose investigation he oversaw - Rosenstein went on to speak at the annual meeting of the Greater Baltimore Committee, where he continued to make waves.
Ex-Deputy AG Rod Rosenstein in a speech in Baltimore tonight is defending his handling of the Mueller probe and taking aim at ex-FBI director James Comey.
Rosenstein also says: “Based on what I knew in May 2017, the investigation of Russian election interference was justified.”
In his prepared remarks, Rosenstein said Trump, “did not tell me what reasons to put in my memo,” but noted what the special counsel report had said. He said he did not include what Trump wanted because it was not relevant, and he did not have personal knowledge of what Comey had told Trump.
Rosenstein said he “did not dislike” Comey but that Comey took steps that were “not within the range of reasonable decisions” during the investigation of Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server. Rosenstein suggested that if he — rather than Trump — had been in charge, “the removal would have been handled very differently, with far more respect and far less drama.”
Continue reading...Hungarian singers allegedly signed paper to bypass stipulation of all-black cast
The Hungarian State Opera has come up with a dubious way around a stipulation that George Gershwin’s opera Porgy and Bess be performed by an all-black cast: it is allegedly asking its white, Hungarian singers to sign a paper saying they identify as African-American.
The company first put on the opera a year ago, leading to a spat with the Gershwin estate, which stipulates the opera should only be performed by a black cast.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Survey of 14 countries show some Europeans now favour “emigration controls”
Southern and eastern European countries are more concerned about emigration than immigration, according to a wide-ranging survey of attitudes in 14 EU countries.
In Spain, Italy, Greece, Poland, Hungary and Romania, six countries where population levels are either flatlining or falling sharply, more citizens said emigration was a worry than immigration, according to the poll by the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR).
Continue reading...Government campaign to boost birth rate features pair from photo that went viral
It was meant to be a poster extolling the virtues of a strong family. But eagle-eyed Hungarians, or indeed anyone who has used social media over the past year, have noticed a small problem.
The latest advert in the Hungarian government’s campaign to boost “traditional” families and increase birth rates features a photograph of a couple who achieved fame for memes depicting infidelity, or at least a distracted partner.
Continue reading...Hungarian PM’s anti-EU attitude is alienating centre-right European People’s party
Viktor Orbán could face renewed calls for his expulsion from the European People’s party (EPP) at a gathering of the powerful centre-right bloc next month.
The Hungarian prime minister and his Fidesz party will be on the agenda of the EPP political assembly on 20 March, an event intended to approve the group’s manifesto before European parliament elections in May.
Continue reading...France reports 74% rise in offences against Jews and Germany records 60% surge in violent attacks
Antisemitism is rising sharply across Europe, experts have said, as France reported a 74% increase in the number of offences against Jews last year and Germany said the number of violent antisemitic attacks had surged by more than 60%.
Related: Hungary tells UK Jewish group to 'mind its own business' over antisemitism
Continue reading...Growing families better than letting Muslim immigrants in, says prime minister
Hungary’s populist prime minister, Viktor Orbán, has promised that women who have four or more children will never pay income tax again, in a move aimed at boosting the country’s population.
Orbán, who has emerged as Europe’s loudest rightwing, anti-immigration voice in recent years, said getting Hungarian families to have more children was preferable to allowing immigrants from Muslim countries to enter.
Continue reading...Viktor Orbán, Hungary’s far-right prime minister, is at the forefront of a nationalist surge in Europe, and his anti-migrant rhetoric has brought condemnation from the EU. The Guardian’s John Domokos went to find out the attraction Orbán holds to Hungarian voters, including his own father. Plus: how one woman is campaigning to prevent her frozen eggs being destroyed
What makes a person vote for Hungary’s nationalist prime minister, Viktor Orbán? It was a question intensely personal to the Guardian’s John Domokos, whose Hungarian father is a believer in economic nationalism, and supports Orbán.
John took a road trip through the country for a Guardian documentary, in the hope of understanding his father’s politics and to try to overcome their differences. He tells Anushka Asthana what he learned, while Kim Lane Scheppele, an expert on Hungary at Princeton University, discusses how far Orbán has strayed from Europe’s democratic norms.
Continue reading...A Guardian film-maker and his father, who left communist Hungary for Britain in the 70s and now supports the nationalist prime minister, Viktor Orbán, take a road trip through the country in the hope of understanding each other and overcoming their differences
Continue reading...German journalist with links to Russia allegedly organised arson attack in Ukraine to stoke tensions, court told
The plot allegedly involved three Polish extremists and a German journalist with ties to the far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) party, as well as to a number of Kremlin-friendly Russian news outlets.
Their alleged task was to carry out a “false flag” operation in western Ukraine: burn down a Hungarian cultural centre, and make it look as though Ukrainian nationalists were responsible. The main beneficiary of the ensuing recriminations would be Russia.
Continue reading...Use of ‘O1G’ expletive illustrates rising anger at PM’s ‘slave law’ and anti-migrant rhetoric
Visitors to Budapest in recent weeks may have noticed the proliferation of a strange three-character code all across the city: “O1G”.
Graffitied on to walls and fences: O1G. Traced into the snow on car windscreens every time a wintry flurry falls: O1G. The abbreviation is short for Orbán egy geci, a pithy phrase deriding the prime minister, Viktor Orbán, using a Hungarian expletive that literally means sperm but is used as a catch-all insult.
Continue reading...Opposition to authoritarian rule reflects increased concern of voters and institutions, Human Rights Watch claims
From Europe to Yemen and Myanmar to the US, authoritarian and populist leaders face an increasingly powerful human rights pushback, according to an influential annual survey of global rights.
Despite mounting pessimism around rights abuses and attacks on democracy by populists on both the far left and far right, the “big news” of the past year was the growing trend to confront abuses by “headline-grabbing autocrats”, said Human Rights Watch.
Continue reading...Anger at Viktor Orbán’s rule in Hungary also directed at courts system and state media
Thousands of protesters in Hungary braved snow and freezing temperatures on a march against Viktor Orbán’s rightwing government, denouncing harsh new legislation that has been dubbed the “slave law”.
Passed in December, it allows companies to demand that staff work up to 400 hours overtime a year – or the equivalent of an extra day a week.
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