Vice-Chancellor Strache hold talks with PM Orbán in Budapest

By protecting its southern border, Hungary also protects Austria’s border, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said on Monday after talks with Vice-Chancellor of Austria Heinz-Christian Strache, who is also chairman of the Freedom Party (FPÖ).

It took Strache and his Freedom Party for Austria to adopt an anti-migration stance and demonstrate sympathy for Hungary’s border protection efforts, Orbán told a joint press conference after the meeting. The previous, left-wing government in Austria did everything in its power to prevent Hungary from building its border fence but everything changed with the right-wing government, he said.

Changes are needed in Europe similar to those in Austria, Orbán added. If Austria’s centre-right ruling party can work together with a patriotic rightist party then this should be possible elsewhere in Europe, he said, adding that what works in Vienna could also work in Brussels.

Orbán described the European left-wing as “hopelessly pro-migration” and said if the centre-right parties were to work together with the left wing then sooner or later they would be forced to make a compromise.

“Instead of a European grand coalition we intend to keep on the agenda the possibility of opening to the right,” he said.

There was general agreement at the meeting that Christian culture must be given priority, because respect for women, the freedom of speech and religion, and the equality of voting rights can only be maintained in a Christian cultural environment, Orbán said.

He also said they were in agreement that Hungarian-Austrian bilateral relations were orderly and successful. He added that he expected further cooperation between Hungary and Austria, describing them as two countries with successful economies.

The European left has an economic programme involving tax increases, bureaucracy and growing debt, which is essentially “a socialist system” that Hungary has already experienced and “would not like to see Brussels experiment with”, Orbán said.

Asked to comment on ruling Fidesz’s decision to withdraw support for Manfred Weber’s candidacy, he said “Hungary’s government and its head” cannot be in the position to support a European commission presidential candidate who has announced that he does not want the vote of Hungarians.

Weber has said he does not want to become commission president with the help of votes from Hungary, Orbán added.

“This is a serious position and a violation of the principle to always respect voters,” Orbán said.

The government does not consider any of the candidates in the EC presidential campaign to be suitable and “we are looking for a suitable candidate”, he said, adding that a complicated series of talks could be expected ahead of the president’s election.

Orbán said that though the “pro-migration forces” — which he said included the left and the majority of the EPP — were in a strong position, the rise of the “anti-migration” forces — the right wing of the EPP and parties to its right — would create “a more balanced situation”.

The prime minister expressed hope that the European Council would eventually have more members who belong to the right wing of the EPP or the parties to its right.

As regards Fidesz’s EPP membership, he said

the party did not see a place for itself in an EPP whose majority comprised “pro-migration forces”.

“This was why we had to suspend our membership rights, to wait and see in which direction the party turns after the election,” Orbán said. He added, however, that the view that the EPP should open to the right, backed by Fidesz, was a minority one within the grouping.