Central Europe: The most important news from June 14th to 20th

By UME

V4

• On June 9, the European Commission decided to go along with the application of the Czech authorities to the ECJ to order Poland to pay a fine of five million euros per day if the Turów mine, in disregard of the preliminary ruling of the European Court of Justice of 21 May continue to operate.
• In view of this dispute between the Czech Republic and Poland, a group of eight Polish and Czech intellectuals published an open letter on the Konservativní Noviny portal on Tuesday June 15, asking the authorities of both countries to resolve this issue bilaterally, without going the detour via the “good offices” of Brussels: “Let’s resolve our differences ourselves, as good neighbors.”

Hungary

• On the sidelines of the NATO summit in Brussels, the Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó met on Sunday, June 13, with their Turkish counterparts Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu to discuss bilateral cooperation in the military and defense industry as well as the To discuss strengthening economic and trade relations between Hungary and Turkey.
• On Monday June 14th, the Mayor of Budapest, Gergely Karácsony and Krisztina Baranyi, the mayor of the Ferencváros district – where a campus of the Chinese Fudan University is planned – presented the results of a local consultation attended by more than 30,000 people. An overwhelming majority of participants (between 96% and 99% depending on the question) rejected any changes to the original student city project and rejected the establishment of the Chinese campus. That is why Mr Karácsony and Mrs Baranyi are calling for a national referendum on this issue, which they consider to be of national importance. In the meantime, on Tuesday, June 15, the Hungarian Parliament approved the bill submitted by the government, which aims to establish a foundation of Fudan University Hungary, to which the land earmarked for the Chinese campus and which is the subject of this dispute will be transferred free of charge. As with the controversial anti-pedophile law, this vote was boycotted by the left-wing parties, while Jobbik abstained.
• According to a poll by the Nézőpont Institute published on Tuesday by the magazine Mandiner (pro-government), Fidesz would – as usual – win next Sunday’s parliamentary elections with 52% of the vote, compared to 43% for the coalition of left parties (including Jobbik), while the nationalist Mi Hazánk party would get 3% from László Toroczkai.
• After several months of health emergencies, a survey of its members carried out by the Independent Trade Union of Healthcare Workers (Független Egészségügyi Szakszervezet, FESZ) in early June showed that 48% of them would consider changing jobs in the near future, while 7 to 8% of them will soon be retiring. “Among the reasons for resigning, the lack of appreciation is very strong, which was also a recurring element in the responses,” says Adriana Soós, the union’s president, explaining a problem that, in her opinion, would affect one in eight professionals.
• The passing of the law against pedophilia by the Hungarian parliamentarians on Tuesday June 15th has generated strong negative reactions from the German and French authorities, the European Union and the United States. Some are considering sanctions against Budapest, which now bans LGBT propaganda targeting minors.
• The Hungarian Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó announced on June 13th that Hungary would take over command of the NATO troops in Kosovo, KFOR, from November.
• Hungarian Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó announced on Wednesday, June 16, at a press conference in Bratislava, where he met with the leaders of the ethnic-Hungarian parties in Slovakia, that Hungary – unless there is an unexpected worsening of the coronavirus -Epidemic is coming – the controls at its intra-Schengen land borders will cease from June 24th. This means that a vaccination certificate or a negative test will no longer be required to enter Hungary from Slovakia, Austria or Slovenia.
• In an interview published on Thursday June 17th by the Croatian weekly Glas Koncila, the Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán spoke about the differences between Brussels and Central Europe: “If we were in the Middle Ages and put a slogan on a flag who would describe my work and my philosophy, I would write: ‘Only dead fish swim with the current’ […] Of course, everyone who goes against the current causes a lot of problems. We pay a heavy price for it. Hungary pays a heavy price for not signing the Istanbul Convention and then rejecting any Cold War policy; we pay a high price for it that we do not beat up the Russian President with Westerners every day, but show him the respect he deserves as President; We pay a heavy price for protecting the Christian model of the family so that LGBT madness has no place here; we pay a high price for our position on immigration and we pay a high price for not accepting the Brussels bureaucracy, but above all as a counterbalance to the development of Central European cooperation. So we really pay a high price. But if we didn’t pay that price and didn’t defend our interests, we could live more comfortably, but we’d end up losing a lot more. Better to fight. I think Miklós Zrínyi [Croat.

Poland

• The Polish LGBT activist Michał Sz. Alias Margot, who led the attack by abortion advocates on abortion advocates on June 27, 2020 in Warsaw and whose arrest caused quite a stir in the left-wing parties, will soon be tried for the brutal attack, which was accompanied by property damage posed. He faces a prison sentence of up to five years.
• After the Deputy Prime Minister Jarosław Gowin, chairman of the Porozumienie party, on Monday, June 14, in an interview with Wirtualna Polska, expressed criticism of the Polish Order, the Polish government’s reconstruction plan after the pandemic, he has now spoken out , The Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki reminded his ally in the coalition of the United Right that he had attended many meetings on the economic program of the PiS and had no objections at the time: Jarosław “Gowin signed absolutely all the acceptances of the Polish Order. He attended a long meeting near Warsaw, the details of which we agreed on. He had previously attended several meetings on which we discussed a number of issues related to the reform of the tax system. Indeed, everyone agrees that the tax system must be progressive, ”he said.
• Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki briefed the Polish Parliament on Wednesday June 16 in a closed session of a wave of cyberattacks against the country’s authorities. “We have recently been exposed to unprecedented cyberattacks against Poland, against Polish institutions and against users of e-mail accounts,” government spokesman Piotr Müller told Polsat News TV on June 15 Health Director, editor’s note Red.], Members of the government and the PiS, but a large group of people ”. According to Michal Dworczyk, whose email was hacked, “the syntax and language of the messages, as well as the metadata of the published files, show that
• The Court of Justice of the European Union (ECJ) passed a judgment this Thursday, April 17th, that could be described as puzzling. He dismissed the lawsuit by Stanisław Zalewski, a former – in this case Polish – inmate of the Auschwitz camp, who objected to the use of the terms “Polish death camps” by several German media – a falsification of the historical truth because although they were on the field of Poland, which was then occupied and partially annexed by Germany, the said camps were set up and administered exclusively by German structures. Unfortunately, that ruling could set a precedent in this area.

Slovakia

• In the case of Kuciak, the Slovak journalist who was murdered together with his partner more than three years ago, the Supreme Court of Slovakia decided to overturn the acquittals of businessman Marian Kočner and his colleague Alena Zsuzsová.
• Today, Thursday, June 17, the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg dismissed the action brought by the Slovak Hungarian-language television broadcaster Servis TV-Videó – a local broadcaster in the town of Párkány (Štúrovo), a 70% Hungarian-speaking town in the south of the country a fine of 165 euros imposed by the Slovak Media Council for failing to subtitle some sentences spoken by witnesses to a traffic accident on July 6, 2012. Slovak law stipulates that everything broadcast in Hungarian must be subtitled in Slovak – without exception.
• This weekend, another edition of the now traditional geopolitical conference GLOBSEC will take place in Bratislava (Pressburg), one of the largest security policy events in Central Europe. The President of Slovakia, Zuzana Čaputová, opened the conference with the words: “In order to build better, we have to apply the lessons learned from the pandemic. We have to set common goals and draw common conclusions from them so that future crises can be avoided. “

Czech Republic

• The Czech Senators approved a motion on Friday June 11th calling on the country’s political representatives not to participate in the Winter Olympics, which will be held in China next year, in protest of the stance of the Chinese government against Tibetans and Uyghurs, but also against Taiwan and the former British colony Hong Kong, reminding that communist China used the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing to “further suppress human rights and freedoms, which also led to massive repression against Minorities “, and the” massive violations of human rights and freedoms, genocide and crimes against humanity, ethnic, […] cultural,religious and political discrimination ”in China.
• The Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babiš made it clear this week in a guest article in the daily Pravó that he does not want to accept “African or Middle Eastern migrants whose way of life is absolutely incompatible with ours” in the Czech Republic.

Slovenia

• 14.06. The parliamentary culture committee discusses the annual report of the Broadcasting Council, the reports on the activities of the Supervisory Board of Radio Television Slovenia (RTVS) for 2019 and 2020 and the annual report of the Slovenian Press Agency (STA) for the past year. Dr. Ignacija Fridl Jarc, State Secretary in the Ministry of Culture, mentioned, among other things, the problem of fake news and disinformation – the Broadcasting Council is also of the opinion that the media legislation should contain a provision that prohibits imprecise reporting by the media and sanctions violations accordingly.
• 15.06. The government spokeswoman for Covid-19, Maja Bratusa, announced the official end of the coronavirus epidemic in Slovenia, which had lasted since October 19, 2020. However, some measures to prevent the disease from spreading remain in place for now.
• 16.06. Prime Minister Janez Janša attended the inauguration of the new terminal in Brnik [Letališče Jožeta Pučnika Ljubljana, Ljubljana Jože Pučnik Airport], from which the first passengers will depart on July 1, the day Slovenia officially presides over the Council the European Union takes over. The functional design of the renovated Ljubljana Airport was largely determined by the investor Fraport Slovenia. “We are opening a terminal that was built at a time of epidemic, when the aviation industry suffered one of the worst blows in modern times,” said Prime Minister Janša.
• 17.06. The Slovenian government passed a bill on intervention measures in support of the economy and tourism to mitigate the consequences of the Covid-19 epidemic, amounting to € 243.5 million. The Intervention Act passed by the government primarily targets the tourism and hospitality, meeting, sport and culture sectors, where there is state aid in the form of funding for annual leave arrangements of € 1,024 per employee, reimbursements for the meeting industry and Provides cash reimbursement of 25% of the eligible costs for the film and audiovisual industries. In addition, new vouchers worth 192.2 million euros were introduced,
• 06/18 Between 6 a.m. on June 18, 2021 and 6 a.m. on June 20, 2021, 10 foreigners were tracked down and arrested by police officers performing their state border protection tasks in the Ljubljana area. They were citizens of Afghanistan and Iran. Slovenian police officers are confronted daily with illegal immigrants entering Slovenia.
• 19.06. The Congress of the Slovenian Democratic Party (SDS) will take place in Slovenske Konjice. The main speaker was the Slovenian Prime Minister and SDS President Janez Janša.
• June 20 Exactly seven years have passed since Janez Janša, the current Prime Minister, went to prison and became a “political prisoner”. The Committee for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms – Committee 2014 was established to demand: an immediate decision by the Supreme Court to suspend Janša’s detention, the repeal of the unconstitutional, unlawful and unjust Patria judgment, the effective restoration of the rule of law, human rights and fundamental freedoms and the establishment of a democratic state.