István Jakab, the deputy speaker of Hungary’s parliament, said Hungary wants to see “a sovereign European Union independent of other powers and influences … which preserves the European values as laid out in the founding treaty”.
Speaking at a conference of the community’s parliamentary speakers, in Prague on Tuesday, Jakab said it was “not the European Commission or the European Parliament that must be competitive, but the nation states making up the European Union, too.” The EU, he insisted, was not a federal structure but “a sui generis organization of nation states”. Europe’s energy security, he said, was “an issue of sovereignty, economy, and national security, rather than one of ideology”. “Due to central Europe’s geopolitical situation we expect more understanding and respect since Hungary in the medium term does not have a realistic alternative to instantly giving up Russian gas imports or nuclear energy,” Jakab said. Discriminating between energy sources on a political or ideological basis made no sense, he said, adding that “no single ideology should become an exclusive gauge; such exclusivity was characteristic of dictatorships such as Communism and Nazism.” “The so-called mainstream media, striving to be exclusive, and pseudo-civil organizations engaged in the ideological promotion will destroy our greatest European value: unity in diversity,” Jakab said. “Legalising drug abuse or sexualising our children is unacceptable, no matter through what insidious or even aggressive drug lobbying or LGBTQ propaganda,” he added. At a meeting on Monday evening, Jakab said Hungary has condemned Russian aggression from the start and stands by Ukrainian sovereignty and integrity. Hungary has spent more than 100 million euros on support for Ukraine and has accepted some 4.8 million refugees, he said. Hungary has a vested interest in a strong, sovereign, democratic Ukraine that ensures the livelihood of the minorities living there, he said. “Recent events in Transcarpathia, the unreasonable firing of Hungarian teachers and the removal of Hungarian symbols are obvious signs of an anti-Hungarian campaign in Ukraine. This is not a bilateral problem as Ukraine is an EU member candidate, and the protection of ethnic minorities is a fundamental value of the EU,” he said. Hungary will support Ukrainian integration into the EU and NATO if they restore the 2015 rights of ethnic minorities, he said.