Select a language
Negotiations turned short, on December 16, when the International Monetary Fund and the European Union suspended talks with Hungary over a financial aid package requested by Budapest. Both institutions consider that the reform of the Hungarian National Bank presented by the government of Prime Minister Viktor Orbán threatens the independence of the bank. The reform bill allows the government and the Parliament, in which Orbán's party holds a two thirds majority, to appoint some of the bank's managers.
For the centre-left daily Népszabadság, this latest episode shows that "the Union has already renounced dealing with the Orbán regime: why are we financing an authoritarian, anti-democratic and anti-European system? The problem is that the delegation is gone but we remain – at the edge of the abyss".
As for right-leaning daily Magyar Hírlap, it highlights that "this was the worse time to attract the anger of the IMF and the EU." The paper adds that "the government committed a tactical error in presenting the new bill on the National Bank during the negotiations," and concludes that "it's better to be with the IMF and the EU than without them."
A conversation with investigative reporters Stefano Valentino and Giorgio Michalopoulos, who have dissected the dark underbelly of green finance for Voxeurop and won several awards for their work.
Go to the event >