From EUobserver · · 1m 50s
Magyar’s U-turn on women’s rights
Hungary’s new PM pledges domestic violence protections as Orbán’s brother faces arrest.
In brief
Hungary’s new PM pledges domestic violence protections as Orbán’s brother faces arrest. Hungary’s prime minister Péter Magyar announced new laws to protect women from domestic violence after his brother Áron Orbán was arrested for helping Vietnamese nationals enter Europe. Originally reported by EUobserver.
Orbán’s brother on a leash
Áron Orbán, Viktor Orbán’s brother, was detained and remanded in pre-trial detention for one month on suspicion of helping Vietnamese nationals enter Europe.
“For 16 years it had been utterly unthinkable that an official measure could reach all the way into former prime minister Viktor Orbán’s family.”
The asset-protection law
The new government launched an investigation into Áron Orbán’s alleged role in visa fraud for Vietnamese nationals.
“According to the Budapest Prosecutor’s Office, over several months in 2:024 Áron Orbán and his three associates helped Vietnamese citizens get to Western Europe via Hungary.”
Péter Magyar and women
Prime minister Péter Magyar faced criticism over communist-era secret police records that wrongly identified 164 people as former agents.
“Lists published from the archives wrongly identified 164 people, including Fidesz politician Sándor Lezsák, as former agents, when they had actually been victims of surveillance.”
The Absolute Movie Theater
Magyar’s video showing naked women calendars in a basement maintenance workshop sparked criticism from Veronika Munk.
“Our former colleague Veronika Munk, editor-in-chief of 444.hu, directly confronted the issue in an opinion piece, sharply criticising the video, the objectification of women’s bodies and the conspiratorial, primitive machismo.”
Magyar’s domestic violence package
Magyar announced new laws to protect women from domestic violence, including tighter restraining orders and criminalizing intimate recording misuse.
“They would tighten restraining-order rules, so that after a request for help the abuser could not approach the victim, for example, at her home or workplace.”
The Istanbul Convention
The government plans to ratify the Istanbul Convention to prevent violence against women and protect victims.
“The government will initiate the ratification of the Istanbul Convention. The convention lays down obligations for preventing violence against women and domestic violence, protecting victims and prosecuting perpetrators.”
New president’s resistance
President András Baka refused to sign a law that could weaken minority shareholder protections.
“Baka argued that the law was too broad, could affect existing funds with no state involvement, and offered insufficient protection to smaller investors.”
Fidesz’s freefall
Fidesz’s support has fallen to 16 percent, down from 55 percent for the Tisza government.
“In the total population, 55 percent would currently vote for the governing party, while Fidesz has fallen to 16 percent.”
Corruption accountability
Four-fifths of Hungarians consider uncovering past corruption cases important, with only eight percent seeing it as unimportant.
“The poll, commissioned by newspaper HVG, shows that four-fifths of Hungarians consider it important to uncover corruption cases from the past 16 years and hold perpetrators to account, and only eight percent see this as of little importance.”
Operation Purgatory
Operation Purgatory has been criticized for being too slow or too harsh, with one-fifth of people saying it’s not fast enough.
“Another fifth, by contrast, think the process is too harsh.”
Orbán’s trial threat
73 percent of Tisza voters believe Viktor Orbán could face trial, with one-third of Fidesz voters also considering it likely.
“Among Tisza voters, 73 percent believe there is a serious chance this will actually happen, and even one-third of Fidesz voters consider it likely that Operation Purgatory will reach all the way to Viktor Orbán.”
The main idea
Hungary’s prime minister Péter Magyar announced new laws to protect women from domestic violence after his brother Áron Orbán was arrested for helping Vietnamese nationals enter Europe.