At first glance, a recent tweet by Daniel Freund, a longtime critic of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and a member of the European Parliament from Germany’s Green Party, may come off as amusing. It reads: “Orban before elections: ‘We are super neutral. We want peace etc.’ Orban after elections: ‘Just kidding. Ukraine is the enemy.’”
But the situation it describes — a strongman who won re-election by claiming it was in Hungary’s interests to stay out of Russia’s war on Ukraine, only to call Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy an “opponent” the next day, along with “the international left” and “the Soros empire” — is all too serious.
Empowered by his solid win over the opposition, Orbán will likely become more repressive at home and enjoy an enhanced reputation abroad as a more palatable alternative to Russian President Vladimir Putin. That’s bad news for democracy, and not only in Hungary.
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