Who is running amok? Hungary is blocking EU foreign policy again

HUNGARY - In Brief 04 Feb 2019 by Istvan Racz

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It seems that PM Orbán's government keeps hammering nails into the coffin of good relations between Hungary and the EU. This time, the theme is a forthcoming summit between the EU and the League of Arab States, scheduled for February 24-25. The EU's foreign ministers were set to discuss their joint position for the summit today, but reaching agreement has been made very difficult by the veto of just one member country, which happens to be Hungary. The latter rejects the EU's common position because it makes reference to the UN's migration policy compact, which was voted against in December 2018 by three EU members, including Hungary, while five others abstained. Even though the EU's objective is to get assistance from Arab states to halt illegal migration into Europe, with which Hungary agrees, the latter has taken the extremist view that legalising (refugee) migration under any conditions would be completely intolerable, and so it does not even want to hear of the UN migration pact, which goes somewhat in that direction, being mentioned in any EU document.This was not the first time Hungary went against everyone else on EU on foreign policy, where the existing decision-making mechanism requires a uniform vote. It happened at least four times already last year, typically on migration issues or when a joint EU statement would have gone against China's interests. But a number of EU governments are running out of patience. The German DPA news agency quoted an EU diplomat saying that 'On Friday, we have witnessed a diplomatic amok run. (...) The Hungarian government rejected even the furthest-going compromise proposals for ideological reasons, and by this attitude it isola...