The war of words between Hungary’s outspoken prime minister Viktor Orban and liberal billionaire George Soros escalated to previously unseen levels on Saturday, when the Hungarian PM said that European Union leaders and Soros are seeking a “new, mixed, Muslimized Europe,” however during a visit to Romania, Orban said that Hungary’s border fences, supported by other Central European countries, will block the EU-Soros effort to increase Muslim migration into Europe.
Slamming the Hungarian-born billionaire who has been accused by the Hungarian government of using his vast wealth to fund pro-mass migration organizations to create a “new, mixed, Muslimized Europe”, Orban said Brussels was in an “alliance against the people’s will” with the financier.
In further defiance to Brussles, Orban said that while Hungary opposed taking in migrants “who could change the country’s cultural identity,” Hungary would remain a place where “Western European Christians will always be able to find security“, AP quoted the prime minister.
Laying out his vision for a future Europe without the influence of Soros, Orban said: “In order for Europe to be able to live, it has to win back its sovereignty from the Soros Empire… Once this is done, migrants must be taken back outside the EU. It sounds strict, but those who came illegally, must be transported back,” Prime Minister Orbán said. “We have to admit that the European continent cannot remain unprotected.”
Discussing immigration to Hungary in a speech that came just days after his government announced the total requests submitted for Hungarian citizenships had hit one million, Orban also said he would continue to oppose migrants “who could change the country’s cultural identity”.
As long as I remain the prime minister, the fence will stay in place. We will protect Hungary and Europe. We can never be in solidarity with ideals, peoples and ethnic groups who set out with the goal to change European culture… because the end result is collapse.
Will Europe be inhabited by Europeans? Will Hungary be inhabited by Hungarians, Germany by Germans, France by the French, Italy by Italians? Who will live in Europe?
Orban also discussed the upcoming political campaign: the Hungarian, who will seek a fourth term in April 2018, said his nation’s opposition parties were no match for his government. “In the upcoming campaign, first of all we have to confront external powers,” Orban said at a cultural festival in Baile Tusnad, Romania. “We have to stand our ground against the Soros mafia network and the Brussels bureaucrats. And, during the next nine months, we will have to fight against the media they operate.”
As reported here over the past 6 months, George Soros has become a key target of Orban and his government (and most recently, Israel too). Recent Hungarian legislation seeks to close or expel Soros’ Budapest-based Central European University, founded by the billionaire in 1991.
There are also new rules about non-governmental organizations funded at least partly from abroad – which critics say stigmatize the NGOs, many of which are backed by Soros’ Open Society Foundations.
Orban repeated his recurring accusation that Soros-funded NGOs want to weaken Hungary’s security with their advocacy for asylum-seekers and said Hungary had managed to stop the “migrant invasion” with razor-wire fences on its borders with Serbia and Croatia. It’s not just Hungary: last week, Gefira exposed what it believes is a major Soros-sponsored Immigration network in Italy.
But back to Hunary, where in Orban’s speech broadcast by Hungarian state media, the PM also repeated his claim that the EU leadership was encroaching on member states’ rights and trying to apply policies, such as increased immigration, which he said were opposed by most Europeans.
Orban also said that Poland, which is under pressure from the EU because of attempts to put its Supreme Court under political control, had replaced Hungary as the target of the EU’s “chief inquisitor,” whom he identified as European Commission Vice-President Frans Timmermans. “The main target of the inquisition, the example of national governance to be weakened, destroyed and broken is Poland,” Orban said, vowing to defend the Polish government. “Hungary will use every legal possibility in the European Union to be in solidarity with the Poles.”
Separately, when asked about choosing between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin, “Orban answered with a joke about a Pole being asked in the communist era to choose between Hitler and Stalin.”
“He answered that he chooses Marlene Dietrich,” Orban said with a laugh. “What I want to say with this is that you can’t give a good answer to a bad question.”
Orban first expressed his support for Trump a year ago, while Putin has visited Hungary twice in two years. Hungary is expanding its energy ties with Moscow, including Russia’s construction of new reactors at Hungary’s only nuclear power plant.
Orban eventually said that “Hungarian interests” would be the “guiding star” of his country’s foreign policy, not “Trump, Putin or Merkel.”
Finally, touching on an argument used by proponents of “replacement migration“, Orban said Hungary’s low birth rate made the country an “endangered species,” and that the government was using taxes on multinational companies to fund social policies that would spur families to have more children. Alas, if Japan is any indication of how “successful” such policies are, Orban may want to reasses.