Hungary will not leave European Union, wants to reform it, Prime Minister Viktor Orban says
- Nationalist Orban faces a parliamentary election next year for the first time in more than a decade and was re-elected chairman of the Fidesz party on Sunday
- Orban has cast himself as a defender of Hungary’s cultural identity against Muslim migration into Europe and a protector of Christian values
Hungary will not leave the European Union but will resist attempts from Brussels to erode its sovereignty, Prime Minister Viktor Orban told his Fidesz party on Sunday.
Nationalist Orban, who faces a close parliamentary election next year for the first time in more than a decade, was re-elected chairman of Fidesz on Sunday.
“After communist bureaucracy … we don’t want new dictates this time from Brussels,” Orban told cheering party delegates, adding Hungary would reject Western liberalism.
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“We will not give up the right to defend our borders, to stop migrants … we insist that marriage in Hungary is between a man and a woman, a father is a man and a mother is a woman … and they should leave our children alone.”
In power since 2010, 58-year-old Orban has cast himself as a defender of Hungary’s cultural identity against Muslim migration into Europe and a protector of Christian values against Western liberalism.
That has won him domestic popularity, especially among core Fidesz voters, but brought criticism from rights groups and LGBT campaigners.
Orban said the EU must be reformed and Hungary’s aim was to achieve change, not leave the bloc that it joined in 2004.