Hungary has lost its right to EU aid worth around one billion euros due to violations of the rule of law. In order to release the money, the country would have had to implement reform requirements by the end of 2024, as a spokeswoman for the European Commission confirmed to the German Press Agency.
The forfeited funds are 1.04 billion euros that were intended for Hungary from programs to promote structurally weak areas. The funds were frozen at the end of 2022 because the EU Commission After analysis, it was concluded that Hungary was disregarding various EU standards and fundamental values.
In order to release the funds, Hungary would have had to implement sufficient reforms by the end of the year. These include, among other things, changes to laws to prevent conflicts of interest and combat corruption.
Loans from China
In order to close financing gaps, Hungary’s right-wing populist Prime Minister Viktor Orbán most recently on China, among others. In April, Hungary called off a loan worth one billion euros from Chinese state banks.
According to the EU Commission, a total of around 19 billion euros in EU funds are currently blocked for Hungary, including further funding and Corona aid. At the beginning of December, Orbán threatened to veto the EU’s next seven-year budget if Brussels did not release the EU funds currently blocked for Hungary.
It was not the first time that Orbán threatened to block key EU decisions. It was only at the EU summit in mid-December that he refused to agree to the extension of the Russia sanctions, which expire at the end of January. Diplomats suspected that he also wanted to extort concessions from his EU partners in other areas.
In December 2023, the Commission released frozen EU funding worth around ten billion euros despite ongoing criticism. MEPs – including those from the German government parties SPD, Greens and FDP – criticized this at the time and accused Commission President Ursula von der Leyen of allowing herself to be blackmailed. Orbán had previously announced that he would block the start of EU accession negotiations with Ukraine and a billion-dollar EU aid package for the country attacked by Russia.
