I guess that depends on what the other leaders said. Even outside EU rules states can exert quite a bit of pressure on other states hence I don’t believe that a small country like Slovakia, despite it’s Russian-friendly government, would dare to become the target of the ire of the countries making up 97% of the EU’s population and 98% of its GDP.
Poland would have under PiS, but not anymore. Unless Slovakia steps up, who would? All others see Orban as a criminal, who siphons money off and ruins his country.
Prime suspects would be Slovakia and Austria in this case. My point was slightly different though: this is just one thing where Hungary might have seemed isolated but I’m pretty sure there are other matters where threat of Hungary veto stopped some initiatives before they could be considered in full.
Imagine EU directive making all member states need to recognize same sex civil unions. Hungary would obviously veto it so why would you bother but there’s still Bulgaria, Romania and Poland that could say nothing and hide behind Hungary.
Identifying the breach requires unanimity (excluding the state concerned), but sanctions require only a qualified majority.
Wait, how does this work? Can sanctions be instated without identifying a country as being in breach? Or is unanimity first required, and only after that, the majority can decide what the sanction is?
Article 7 suspends their voting rights. Requires unanimity of all other EU members.
It’s the closest EU charter allows to evicting a member state. It effectively suspends the state’s membership.
Quite frankly the should have. Orban is a blatantly corrupt Putin lapdog who has been siphoning EU funds for years into his own pocket and that of his cronies.
Yeah, I get that people outside Italy were worried when she was elected (I was too) but I’ve not seen any real controversial EU policy from her government. That’s from outside though.
She immediately reassured european partners, also stood with Ukraine since day one: not obviois on that side of the parliament. So yeah, could have been worse…
Slovakia, I don't know, but the Netherlands not really. The one party that might want to veto it, while the biggest in parliament, only ("only") got 20% of the votes. If they get to govern (which is not set in stone yet), they'll have to do so in a coalition with other parties who would not let that happen.
Hungary used to have a mutual defence pact with PiS-era Poland that scuppered any attempts by the EU to discipline either country. Not that PiS are no longer in power in Poland, hasn’t Fico’s Slovakia stepped into the role?
Fico and other similar politicians are still great friends with orban. Even the Slovak National Party, which is ironic because they were incredibly anti-hungrian bck in the day. But sharing dream of totalitarian country unites.
I bet Putin would lovento get us back into Russian sphere of influence as well and yet Fico and co. still lick his boots.
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