Silvana Heißenberg was a renowned actress in Germany until she publicly criticized Angela Merkel’s migration policy. Following this, she was labelled a Nazi, subjected to a smear campaign, and effectively blacklisted from employment. She has now relocated to Hungary to begin a new, safer chapter of her life.
‘The Agreement on the EU–Türkiye Statement regarding the Migration Deal is considered a turning point in EU–Türkiye relations, as it divided opinions on whether it had been worth entering into an alliance with the other party at such a price. However, its strategic importance was intended to be significant.’
The Free Market Road Show, held for the ninth time, was organized in collaboration with the Austrian Economics Center and the Danube Institute. This year’s speakers discussed topics such as Central Bank Digital Currencies and the related issues of individual freedom and privacy, new economic strategies for a post-COVID world, and how global security threats, such as wars and migration, affect trade.
Since 2013, migration pressure on Europe has become the new normal, and in recent years the situation has once again worsened: 2023 saw the highest number of illegal immigrants reaching Europe since 2016. Due to the worsening security situation in the Sahel region and the economic difficulties afflicting North Africa, the Middle East, and Central Asia, nearly one million people applied for asylum in the EU.
The regulations of the new pact include, for instance, faster processing of asylum applications, more efficient return of those who do not have the right to stay in the EU, and solidarity in the distribution of migrants between Member States.
‘Viktor Orbán showed us that an alternative to the leftist, open-border government is not only possible but can be highly successful and popular amongst the people. That’s inspiring. However, for it to be a true success, the seeds planted by Hungary in the rest of Europe have to sprout as well. And that is not the responsibility of Viktor Orbán or the Hungarians, but of right-wing politicians in other countries.’
Fabrice Leggeri, the ‘guest of honour’ at the event, who served as the director of Frontex from 2015 to 2022 opined that the European Union as a rule attempts to dissuade member states from defending their own borders.
‘If working people are voting more right: as in Australia in my 2013 election, America in Trump’s 2016 election, Britain in Boris Johnson’s 2019 Brexit election, and here in Hungary for the past decade, that’s because the main party of the right has become more economically pragmatic, more focussed on the social fabric, more targeted towards people’s living standards, and more concerned to uphold its own country’s interests over “global” ones.’
Prime Minister Orbán spoke to Yoram Hazony at a panel discussion at NatCon 2024 in Brussels, Belgium. A two-minute clip of the interview, in which he discusses illegal migration and Hungary’s approach to it, went viral on X, receiving over 40,000 likes.
Prime Minister Robert Fico of Slovakia has announced that his administration is not willing to implement the migration dictates included in the EU’s newly accepted migration pact. PM Viktor Orbán of Hungary and PM Donald Tusk of Poland have already voiced their objections to the pact.
Hungarian Conservative is a quarterly magazine on contemporary political, philosophical and cultural issues from a conservative perspective.
