Someone is obviously lying. We don’t know who, but we will find out. Apparently, a supposedly independent German newspaper has falsified the words of the EP’s vice president. Later, the supposedly independent German paper assumed responsibility, saying they simply wrote done something never uttered by the EP’s vice president.
EP Vice-President Katarina Barley’s words have been falsified, exaggerated and rewritten by Deutschlandfunk (DLF).
Reacting to the transcript of Deutschlandfunk’s interview, the EP Vice President reiterated her original words that it’s not Hungary, but Viktor Orban who should be “financially starved”. The German paper published an interview with the politician on Thursday, quoting her as saying that member states such as Hungary and Poland “must be financially starved.”
The next morning, the vice president called for a correction, which DLF made, acknowledging that Ms Barley’s statements were “falsified and exaggerated” in the article.
Hungarian State Secretary for International Communication Zoltan Kovacs took to Twitter to react to Katarina Barley’s statement. “So no apologies – rather changing the text of the interview in retrospect. We are more than concerned about media freedom in Germany,” the state secretary tweeted.
Polish senator Marek Pek was also among the first to respond to the interview. The politician tweeted that Ms Barley should not only consider her choice of words more carefully, but she should also think of German companies that make huge profits in Poland and as a result, would also be doomed to “starve.”
Several politicians find Ms Barley’s words to be reminiscent of Nazi rhetoric. Earlier, state secretary Zoltan Kovacs shared a question on Twitter, asking Ms Barley “which part of your German know-how would you like to use when talking about starving out, the one that comes from Warsaw, Leningrad or Stalingrad?”
Polish MEP Ryszard Czarnecki also noted that Ms Barley should be more careful with her words, since “if a German politician speaks of starvation, it can easily be associated with past events when certain individuals asserted their aspirations for power on Europe’s inhabitants and societies.”
Polish Chancellery Chief Michal Dworczyk had a similar assessment of the situation, adding that “Germany has some experience in persecuting and starving Poles.” He also said he expects a formal apology from the EP’s vice president.
Following DLF’s brief apology, Mr Czarnecky said the irony of receiving an apology from the radio and not the politician wasn’t lost on him.