🇨🇳➡️🇪🇺 "For the first time in 5 years, the leader of China will come to Europe. Xi Jinping makes rare visit to France, Serbia and Hungary", - The Economist
🇫🇷 In Paris, Macron will "press" him on Ukraine and the trade imbalance, — Reuters.
🕊️ He also plans to discuss the "Olympic truce", - La Tribune
A generation ago, Hungarians turned out en masse in their capital of #Budapest to joyfully shed the grip of the Soviet Union.
But fast forward to today: #Hungary has emerged—in the view of Washington and #Brussels—as the biggest troublemaker inside #NATO, with moves such as opposing sanctions against #Russia for its war on Ukraine and delaying #Sweden’s entry into the Atlantic alliance.
On 1 May 2004, the citizens of 🇨🇾 🇨🇿 🇪🇪 🇭🇺 🇱🇻 🇱🇹 🇲🇹 🇵🇱 🇸🇰 🇸🇮 became citizens of the EU.
Since then, we have witnessed growth and prosperity. Real wages have doubled from 2004 to 2023 in these ten countries, while poverty levels have halved.
Our Union has benefitted from more innovations. The free movement of goods, services, capital and people, have brought greater opportunities for people and businesses.
As with #Russia, #Israel, and other places, not the country or even its peoples are the problem but the often illegally elected regimes or their actions contrary to international law and in violation of human rights.
That said, I do hope that the "leaders" of the aforementioned countries, including #Hungary's, will be ousted sooner rather than later.
#Slovakia’s nationalist prime minister, Robert #Fico, is moving ahead with a law targeting non-governmental organisations that critics say is inspired by #Hungary’s crackdown on civil rights groups.
Fico’s coalition, on Tuesday passed the draft law. Under the bill, NGOs that receive more than €5,000 a year in foreign funding must be registered as “organisations with foreign support” and list their donors.
'This year's European and local elections may be the toughest in #Orban 's 14-year rule with Hungary's economy in recession, the abuse scandal striking his family-values platform at its core, and a political newcomer threatening to upend the status quo. Even so, Orban's #Fidesz remains the most popular party in Hungary.'