Trump meets with Hungary’s leader, Viktor Orban, continuing his embrace of autocrats

Trump meets with Hungary’s leader, Viktor Orban, continuing his embrace of autocrats
Hungary's Prime Minister Viktor Orban meets with his "good friends", former US President Donald Trump, at Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida on March 8, 2024. (Instagram: orbanviktor)
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Updated 09 March 2024
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Trump meets with Hungary’s leader, Viktor Orban, continuing his embrace of autocrats

Trump meets with Hungary’s leader, Viktor Orban, continuing his embrace of autocrats
  • Orban, an icon to some conservative populists for championing what he calls “illiberal democracy,” spoke at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank helping Trump's bid to return to power

Former President Donald Trump met Friday with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, as the likely Republican presidential nominee continued his embrace of autocratic leaders who are part of a global pushback against democratic traditions.

Orban has become an icon to some conservative populists for championing what he calls “illiberal democracy,” replete with restrictions on immigration and LGBTQ+ rights. But he’s also cracked down on the press and judiciary in his country and rejiggered the country’s political system to keep his party in power while maintaining the closest relationship with Russia among all European Union countries.

In the US, Trump’s allies have embraced Orban’s approach. On Thursday, as foreign dignitaries milled through Washington, D.C., ahead of President Joe Biden’s State of the Union address, Orban skipped the White House and instead spoke at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank overseeing the 2025 Project, the effort to create a governing blueprint for Trump’s next term.

“Supporting families, fighting illegal migration and standing up for the sovereignty of our nations. This is the common ground for cooperation between the conservative forces of Europe and the US,” Orban wrote on X, formerly Twitter, after his Heritage appearance.

He then flew to Florida, where he met Trump late Friday afternoon at the former president’s beachfront compound, Mar-a-Lago. Orban posted on his Instagram account footage of him and his staff meeting with Trump and the former president’s staff, then of the prime minister walking through the compound and handing Melania Trump a giant bouquet of flowers.

In the video, Trump praised Orban to a laughing crowd. “He’s a non-controversial figure because he says, ‘This is the way it’s going to be,’ and that’s the end of it. Right?” Trump said of the Hungarian prime minister. “He’s the boss.”

Orban’s approach appeals to Trump’s brand of conservatives, who have abandoned their embrace of limited government and free markets for a system that sides with their own ideology, said Dalibor Rohac, a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.

“They want to use the tools of government to reward their friends and punish their opponents, which is what Orban has done,” Rohac said.

The meeting also comes as Trump has continued to embrace authoritarians of all ideological stripes. He’s praised Russian President Vladimir Putin, Chinese President Xi Jinping and North Korea’s Kim Jong Un. Orban’s government has reciprocated, repeatedly praising the former president.

On Friday, Hungary’s Foreign Minister, Péter Szijjártó, posted from Palm Beach, hailing Trump’s “strength” and implying that the world would be more peaceful were he still president.

“If Donald Trump had been elected President of the United States in 2020, the war in Ukraine, now in its third year, would not have broken out and the conflict in the Middle East would have been resolved much faster,” he wrote.

Orban has served as Hungary’s prime minister since 2010. The next year, his party, Fidesz, used its two-thirds majority in the legislature to rewrite the nation’s constitution. It changed the retirement age for judges, forcing hundreds into early retirement, and vested responsibility for appointing new judges with a single political appointee who was widely accused of acting on behalf of Fidesz.

Fidesz later authored a new media law and set up a nine-member council to serve as the country’s media regulator. All nine members are Fidesz appointees, which media watchdogs say has facilitated a major decline in press freedom and plurality.

The country’s legislative lines have been redrawn to protect Fidesz members and no major news outlets remain that are critical of Orban’s government, making it almost impossible for his party to lose elections, analysts say.

Orban backed Trump’s reelection effort and has had frosty relations with the Biden administration, which pointedly did not invite Hungary to a summit on democracy it organized after the president took office. Hungarian officials have accused Biden’s ambassador to the country, former human rights lawyer David Pressman, of interfering in internal governmental affairs.

Earlier this week, Hungary objected to Biden’s choice of a former Dutch prime minister to serve as NATO’s new commander, potentially stalling the appointment.

The Hungarian leader also has enthusiastically boosted Trump’s latest presidential campaign, posting a message encouraging Trump to “keep fighting” after he was hit with the first of what would be four criminal cases against him last year. Last week, Orban declared that a win by the former president would be “the only serious chance” for ending the war in Ukraine.

A video from the Heritage appearance posted by Orban’s political director showed the prime minister speaking with Vivek Ramaswamy, a pharmaceutical entrepreneur who unsuccessfully ran for the Republican presidential nomination before dropping out and endorsing Trump. The Hungarian leader also met with Steve Bannon, a former Trump adviser who remains a vocal ally of the ex-president and is active in global populist circles.

Orban’s visit this week comes after he signed a new National Sovereignty Law that penalizes any foreign support of political actors in Hungary, part of the prime minister’s longstanding battle against the European Union and international nonprofits criticizing his erosion of Hungary’s democracy.

“Orban is setting up this huge barrier to anyone interfering in Hungarian elections, but Orban’s interfering in all sorts of other countries’ elections,” said Kim Scheppele, a Princeton sociologist and Hungary expert.

Orban is one of a small group of conservative populists who have publicly aligned themselves with US conservatives trying to oust Biden in November. Last month, Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele and Argentine President Javier Milei spoke at the Conservative Political Action Conference just outside Washington. Orban was a featured speaker at the 2022 event, after which he met Trump at the former president’s New Jersey golf course.

Several conservative populists have won European elections in recent years, including in Italy and Sweden. But leaders in those countries have remained staunch opponents of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, not battled with the European Union government or taken steps that alarm democracy advocates as Orban has.

Scheppele said the parallels between Trump and Orban go beyond ideology. She noted that Orban is not very religious but has become a hero to Christian conservatives for his hard-line stances, much like Trump.

The two men face a similar electoral quandary as well, she added.

“They’ve got the same problem,” Scheppele said. “How do you leverage a really solid base, which is not an actual majority, at election time?”


US charges billionaire Gautam Adani with defrauding investors, hiding plan to bribe Indian officials

US charges billionaire Gautam Adani with defrauding investors, hiding plan to bribe Indian officials
Updated 5 sec ago
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US charges billionaire Gautam Adani with defrauding investors, hiding plan to bribe Indian officials

US charges billionaire Gautam Adani with defrauding investors, hiding plan to bribe Indian officials
Gautam Adani, 62, was charged in an indictment unsealed Wednesday with securities fraud
Several other people connected to Adani, his businesses and the project were also charged

NEW YORK: An Indian businessman who is one of the world’s richest people has been indicted in the US on charges he duped investors in a massive solar energy project in his home country by concealing that it was facilitated by alleged bribery.
Gautam Adani, 62, was charged in an indictment unsealed Wednesday with securities fraud and conspiring to commit securities and wire fraud.
He is accused of defrauding investors who poured several billion dollars into the project by failing to tell them about more than $250 million in bribes paid to Indian officials to secure lucrative solar energy supply contracts.
Several other people connected to Adani, his businesses and the project were also charged.
Gautam Adani is a power player in the world’s most populous nation. He built his fortune in the coal business coal in the 1990s. His Adani Group grew to involve many aspects of Indian life, from making defense equipment to building roads to selling cooking oil.
In recent years, Adani has made big moves into renewable energy.
Last year, a US-based financial research firm accused Adani his company of “brazen stock manipulation” and “accounting fraud.” The Adani Group called the claims “a malicious combination of selective misinformation and stale, baseless and discredited allegations.”
The firm in question is known as a short-seller, a Wall Street term for traders that essentially bet on the prices of certain stocks to fall, and it had made such investments in relation to the Adani Group.

Ukraine fires UK Storm Shadow cruise missiles into Russia, a day after using US ATACMS

Ukraine fires UK Storm Shadow cruise missiles into Russia, a day after using US ATACMS
Updated 20 November 2024
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Ukraine fires UK Storm Shadow cruise missiles into Russia, a day after using US ATACMS

Ukraine fires UK Storm Shadow cruise missiles into Russia, a day after using US ATACMS
  • Biden let Ukraine use ATACMS two months before he leaves office
  • US closes embassy out of "abundance of caution" after airstrike scare

KYIV: Ukraine fired a volley of British Storm Shadow cruise missiles into Russia on Wednesday, the latest new Western weapon it has been permitted to use on Russian targets a day after it fired US ATACMS missiles.
The strikes were widely reported by Russian war correspondents on Telegram and confirmed by an official on condition of anonymity.
Moscow has said the use of Western weapons to strike into Russian territory far from the border would be a major escalation in the conflict. Kyiv says it needs the capability to defend itself by hitting Russian rear bases used to support Moscow’s invasion, which entered its thousandth day this week.
Russian war correspondent accounts on Telegram posted footage they said included the sound of the missiles striking in Kursk region. At least 14 huge explosions can be heard, most of them preceded by the sharp whistle of what sounds like an incoming missile. The footage, shot in a residential area, showed black smoke rising in the distance.
The pro-Russian Two Majors Telegram channel said Ukraine had fired up to 12 Storm Shadows into the Kursk region, and carried pictures of pieces of missile with the name Storm Shadow clearly visible.
A spokesperson for British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said his office would not be commenting on reports or operational matters.
Britain had previously allowed Ukraine to use Storm Shadows within Ukrainian territory. The Kyiv government has been pressing Western partners for permission to use such weapons to strike targets deep inside Russia, and obtained the all-clear from US President Joe Biden to use the ATACMS this week, two months before Biden leaves office.
Biden’s successor, President-elect Donald Trump, has said he will end the war, without saying how. The warring sides have interpreted this as likely to involve a push for peace talks — not known to have been held since the war’s earliest months — and are trying to seize a strong position before negotiations.
The Storm Shadows have a range in excess of 250 km (155 miles) and would give Ukraine the ability to hit targets far deeper into Russia than before.
Kyiv says Moscow, which invaded Ukraine in February 2022, has previously taken advantage of limits on its use of weapons, particularly to strike Ukrainian cities from the air with heavy guided bombs.
Western countries say the arrival of more than 10,000 North Korean troops to fight for Russia in recent weeks was an escalation that merited a response.
The first use of the US ATACMS on Tuesday, fired at a Russian arsenal in the Bryansk region, prompted firm words from Moscow, which announced a change to its nuclear doctrine to lower the threshold for the use of atomic weapons. Washington has said it sees no need to adjust its own nuclear posture and accused Moscow of resorting to irresponsible rhetoric.
Military analysts have said the longer range missiles are unlikely to give Ukraine a decisive edge in the war but could help it strengthen its position, especially in the battle for a sliver of land inside Russia’s Kursk region it seized in August.

With tension higher over the use of the missiles, the United States shut its embassy in Kyiv on Wednesday morning “out of an abundance of caution” due to what it called the threat of a significant air attack.
Later, after an air raid siren in the early afternoon jangled nerves in the capital. Ukraine’s military spy agency ultimately said the threat was fake and accused Russia of trying to sow panic by circulating online messages about a looming missile and drone attack.
“The enemy, unable to subdue Ukrainians by force, resorts to measures of intimidation and psychological pressure on society. We ask you to be vigilant and steadfast,” it said.
A US government source said the embassy closure was “related to ongoing threats of air attacks.” The Italian and Greek embassies said they too had closed their doors. The French embassy remained open but urged its citizens to be cautious.
The Kremlin said it had no comment.
Russian foreign intelligence chief Sergei Naryshkin said in an interview published on Wednesday that Moscow would retaliate against NATO countries that facilitate long-range Ukrainian missile strikes against Russian territory.
The war is at a volatile juncture, with nearly a fifth of Ukrainian territory in Russian hands, North Korean troops deployed in Russia’s Kursk region and doubts over the future of Western aid under Trump, whose nominees for administration posts include skeptics of support for Kyiv.
On Sunday, Russia staged a missile and drone strike on Ukraine’s national power grid that killed seven people and renewed fears over the durability of the hobbled energy network.


Under-fire Spain minister defends state agencies’ role in floods

Under-fire Spain minister defends state agencies’ role in floods
Updated 20 November 2024
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Under-fire Spain minister defends state agencies’ role in floods

Under-fire Spain minister defends state agencies’ role in floods
  • Doubting state agencies was “deeply unfair and deeply dangerous,” Ribera told parliament
  • “I would like to thank the work and dedication of the public servants who issued the information as was their duty“

MADRID: Spain’s under-fire ecological transition minister, a candidate for a top European Commission post, on Wednesday said questioning the role of state agencies during the country’s devastating floods was “dangerous.”
The state weather and environment services have faced intense scrutiny over their response to the October 29 disaster that wreaked widespread destruction and killed 227 people.
The European Parliament has blocked Teresa Ribera’s appointment to an influential EU commission role encompassing environment and competition, with opponents accusing her of neglecting her duties during the floods.
Regions are in charge of disaster management in Spain’s decentralized political system, but the hardest-hit Valencia region’s conservative leader Carlos Mazon said he received “insufficient, inaccurate and late” information.
Doubting state agencies was “deeply unfair and deeply dangerous,” Ribera told parliament, in a veiled retort to the conservative opposition.
“I would like to thank the work and dedication of the public servants who issued the information as was their duty,” she added.
Mazon defended his handling of the catastrophe last week, citing an “information blackout” and criticizing a government agency responsible for monitoring river levels.
But Ribera said “there was never an information blackout” and enumerated a lengthy list of warnings issued by public bodies to the regional authorities.
Although the national weather agency issued the highest red alert in the morning of October 29, Valencia residents in many cases only received telephone warnings when water was already gushing through towns.
The socialist-led central government has argued Mazon bore responsibility for the late issuing of the emergency alert.
“Having all the necessary information is of little use if the one who must respond does not know how,” Ribera added.
The right-wing opposition Popular Party (PP) has accused the government of abandoning the Valencia region before and after the floods for political gain.
Anger has coursed through Spain over the authorities’ perceived mishandling of the country’s deadliest floods in decades and the ensuing political polarization has spilled over at EU level.
The conservative EPP parliamentary group to which the PP belongs refused to approve Spain’s nomination for the commission until she reported to the Spanish parliament.
“The European Commission does not deserve to come into existence with a candidate under suspicion,” PP leader Alberto Nunez Feijoo wrote on X.
The Socialists and Democrats group have complained that the Spanish right was trying to make Ribera “the scapegoat” for its own failure to manage the floods in Valencia.
By doing so, it was “pushing the entire European Union to the brink in the most irresponsible way,” it said.
Socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez on Tuesday said his party always backed PP candidates for the commission and urged “reciprocity” from them.


Spain will legalize hundreds of thousands of undocumented migrants in the next 3 years

Spain will legalize hundreds of thousands of undocumented migrants in the next 3 years
Updated 20 November 2024
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Spain will legalize hundreds of thousands of undocumented migrants in the next 3 years

Spain will legalize hundreds of thousands of undocumented migrants in the next 3 years
  • The policy aims to expand the aging country’s workforce and allow foreigners living in Spain without proper documentation to obtain work permits and residency
  • Spain has largely remained open to receiving migrants even as other European nations seek to tighten their borders to illegal crossings and asylum seekers

MADRID: Spain will legalize about 300,000 undocumented migrants a year, starting next May and through 2027, the country’s migration minister said Wednesday.
The policy aims to expand the aging country’s workforce and allow foreigners living in Spain without proper documentation to obtain work permits and residency. Spain has largely remained open to receiving migrants even as other European nations seek to tighten their borders to illegal crossings and asylum seekers.
Spain needs around 250,000 registered foreign workers a year to maintain its welfare state, Migration Minister Elma Saiz said in an interview on Wednesday. She contended that the legalization policy is not aimed solely at “cultural wealth and respect for human rights, it’s also prosperity.”
“Today, we can say Spain is a better country,” Saiz told national broadcaster Radiotelevisión Española.
Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez has often described his government’s migration policies as a means to combat the country’s low birthrate. In August, Sánchez visited three West African nations in an effort to tackle irregular migration to Spain’s Canary Islands.
The archipelago off the coast of Africa is seen by many as a step toward continental Europe with young men from Mali, Senegal, Mauritania and elsewhere embarking on dangerous sea voyages there seeking better job opportunities abroad or fleeing violence and political instability at home.
The new policy, approved Tuesday by Spain’s leftist minority coalition government, simplifies administrative procedures for short and long-term visas and provides migrants with additional labor protections. It extends a visa offered previously to job-seekers for three months to one year.
By mid-November, some 54,000 undocumented migrants had reached Spain this year by sea or land, according to the country’s Interior Ministry. The exact number of foreigners living in Spain without documentation is unclear.
Many irregular migrants make a living in Spain’s underground economy as fruit pickers, caretakers, delivery drivers, or other low-paid but essential jobs often passed over by Spaniards.
Without legal protections, they can be vulnerable to exploitation and abuse. Saiz said the new policy would help prevent such abuse and “serve to combat mafias, fraud and the violation of rights.”
Spain’s economy is among the fastest-growing in the European Union this year, boosted in part by immigration and a strong rebound in tourism after the pandemic.
In 2023, Spain issued 1.3 million visas to foreigners, according to the government.


Danish military says it staying close to Chinese ship after data cable breaches

Danish military says it staying close to Chinese ship after data cable breaches
Updated 20 November 2024
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Danish military says it staying close to Chinese ship after data cable breaches

Danish military says it staying close to Chinese ship after data cable breaches
  • Chinese bulk carrier Yi Peng 3 was anchored in the Kattegat strait between Denmark and Sweden on Wednesday
  • “The Danish Defense can confirm that we are present in the area near the Chinese ship Yi Peng 3,” the military said

STOCKHOLM: The Danish military said on Wednesday that it was staying close to a Chinese ship currently sitting idle in Danish waters, days after two fiber-optic data telecommunication cables in the Baltic Sea were severed.
Chinese bulk carrier Yi Peng 3 was anchored in the Kattegat strait between Denmark and Sweden on Wednesday, with a Danish navy patrol ship at anchor nearby, MarineTraffic vessel tracking data showed.
“The Danish Defense can confirm that we are present in the area near the Chinese ship Yi Peng 3,” the military said in a post on social media X, adding it had no further comments.
It is quite rare for Denmark’s military to comment publicly on individual vessels traveling in Danish waters. It did not mention the cable breaches or say why it was staying with the ship.
The Chinese ship left the Russian port of Ust-Luga on Nov. 15 and was in the areas where the cable damages occurred, according to traffic data, which showed other ships to have been in the areas too.
One cable running between Sweden and Lithuania
was cut
on Sunday and another one between Finland and Germany was severed less than 24 hours later on Monday.
The breaches happened in Sweden’s exclusive economic zone and Swedish prosecutors started a preliminary investigation on Tuesday on suspicion of possible sabotage.
Swedish Civil Defense Minister Carl-Oskar Bohlin told Reuters on Tuesday that the country’s armed forces and coast guard had picked up ship movements that corresponded with the interruption of two telecoms cables in the Baltic Sea.
A Chinese government spokesperson told a daily news briefing on Wednesday that it always required its vessels to abide by relevant laws and regulations.
“We also attach great importance to the protection of seabed infrastructure and, together with the international community, we are actively promoting the construction and protection of submarine cables and other global information infrastructures,” the spokesperson said.
Russia dismissed on Wednesday any suggestion that it had been involved in damaging the two cables.
European governments accused Russia on Tuesday of escalating hybrid attacks on Ukraine’s Western allies, but stopped short of directly accusing Russia of destroying the cables.
Asked about the matter on Wednesday, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told a regular news briefing: “It is quite absurd to continue to blame Russia for everything without any reason.”