“We say no to outsourcing the rule of law”
On Monday, Minister of Justice Judit Varga held talks on the rule of law in Hungary and the future of Europe.
In a Facebook postVarga said that she had told Sweden’s EU Minister Hans Dahlgren that reports in the international media about the rule of law in Hungary should be treated with caution because they were “often one-sided”. “This also applies to the independent and objective reports published by the European Commission,” she added.
Varga said that the EU’s rule of law procedures were “political witch hunts disguised as legal proceedings”, of which she said the latest example was the “series of attacks” launched against Hungary against its child protection law.
The minister said in her talks that she emphasized Hungary’s position that parents should have the exclusive right to decide how they raise their children, a position she said “Brussels must also understand”.
Varga said that she and Dahlgren had also discussed the challenges facing Europe. She said that despite their different cultures and geographical distances, Hungary and Sweden shared the goal of “putting Europe back on the global map” and stressed that this was only possible to achieve as a community of strong nation states.
“Hungary’s vision remains straightforward: we do not want to live in a European empire,” Varga said. “Integration is a means and not an end in itself,” she said, demanding that the goal of an ever closer union between the peoples of Europe be removed from the EU’s founding treaty. Decisions should be made by Europe’s elected leaders rather than international NGOs, she added.
“We say no to outsourcing the rule of law,” said Varga. She said that the strength of European integration stems from common economic success, adding that the failure of Member States to be more successful together than on their own would mean the end of the EU.
Varga also said that the coming decade would be marked by “dangerous challenges” including mass migration and pandemics that European people needed to be protected from.
The Minister also called for the restoration of European democracy. She said the European Parliament had “proved to be a dead end” which only represented “its own ideological and institutional interests”. Varga called for a greater role for national parliaments and for Serbia to be allowed for the EU.
Selected photos via Judit Varga’s Facebook page