Viktor Orbán: no tax for Hungarian women with four or more children

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.

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Hungary, populism and my Orbán-voting father

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.

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Polish far-right trial raises spectre of ‘false flag’ tactics

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.

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Hungary: pithy insult dogs Orbán as anti-government protesters resort to ridicule

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.

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Populist leaders face mounting resistance, say global rights experts

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.

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Thousands in Budapest march against ‘slave law’ forcing overtime on workers

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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EU legislators say ‘yes’ to disciplinary action against Hungary

The most severe punishment under the Article 7 procedure is stripping Hungary of its voting rights in the EU [Vincent Kessler/Reuters] European Union legislators voted overwhelmingly in favour of launching punitive action against the Hungarian government for flouting democratic rules in With 448 votes in favour, 197 against and 48 abstentions, the motion passed in the plenary session on Wednesday, the first time ever the European legislature triggered an Article 7 procedure against an EU member state. Dutch Greens MEP Judith Sargentini, who spearheaded the vote, smiled broadly and breathed a sigh of relief before embracing her supporters in parliament in the French city of Strasbourg.

Hungarian parties rip into each other before Sunday’s vote

Hungarians will vote Sunday in parliamentary elections, choosing 199 lawmakers and ... . Security personnel drag a man holding a banner that reads "There is no freedom after speech in this country" ahead of the final electoral rally of Prime Minister Viktor Orban's Fidesz party in, Szekesfehervar, Hungary, Frida... .

Holocaust remembered as warning amid far-right resurgence

A man lights a candle at the Victims' Memorial Wall bearing names of victims during a commemoration marking the International Holocaust Remembrance Day in the Holocaust Memorial Centre in Budapest, Hungary, Friday, Jan. 26, 2... . Hungarian Holocaust survivor, Katalin Sommer, lights a candle at the Victims' Memorial Wall bearing names of victims during a commemoration marking the International Holocaust Remembrance Day in the Holocaust Memorial Centre ... .

Former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page met with Hungarian officials in Budapest

Carter Page, a foreign policy adviser to Donald Trump's 2016 presidential campaign, speaks with reporters Nov. 2, 2017 on Capitol Hill in Washington. The travels by onetime Trump campaign adviser Carter Page to meet with senior officials in Hungary during the 2016 Presidential election are being closely examined by congressional investigators, given the increasingly close ties between Hungary and Russia and the role of the country as a central hub for Russian intelligence activity.

Daughter of American rep. returns state award to Hungary

The daughter of the late Rep. Tom Lantos is returning a state award to Hungary to protest the same award being presented to a nationalist journalist described as racist and anti-Semitic, JTA reported Monday. Dr. Katrina Lantos Swett joins about 100 other Hungarians or people of Hungarian heritage in returning the Knight's Cross of the Order of Merit, to protest the recognition last month of the right-wing journalist and columnist Zsolt Bayer for his writings.