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11 March 2013

Bloomberg: Hungary to amend constitution as EU monitors backsliding


Hungarian Premier Viktor Orban's lawmakers will approve a constitutional amendment to curtail judicial authority, setting up a showdown with European Union nations seeking to sanction members that violate basic values.

The amendment would overturn some court cases and limit legal interpretation by judges, provisions previously shot down by the Constitutional Court. The move comes after the foreign ministers of Germany, Denmark, Finland and the Netherlands pushed for imposing EU funding cuts on Member States that violate the 27-nation bloc’s democratic values, in a March 6 letter[1] to European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso. Barroso told Orban on March 8 that parts of his amendment may breach EU law.

Orban has asserted his influence over independent institutions since winning elections in 2010 with a two-thirds parliamentary majority, drawing criticism from the EU, the United States and the United Nations. His lawmakers passed a new constitution over opposition protests, ousted the chief justice of the Supreme Court, narrowed the mandate of the top court and set up a media regulator led by ruling-party appointees.

Orban, who has said he’s waging a “freedom fight” to restore the economic sovereignty of the eastern EU’s most indebted member, at times has dismissed EU criticism while in some cases he’s compromised, such as on a central bank law that the commission argued would have undermined monetary-policy independence if left unchanged.

Full article

[1] Nations seek EU mechanism to protect bloc’s values - reporting © WHEC-TV, LLC



© Bloomberg


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