Poland gives Orban the cold shoulder

HUNGARIAN Prime Minister Viktor Orban, pictured, is losing friends.

The steady friendship between Hungary and Poland, who for years gave each other cover as they defied the EU over the rule of law, has frozen over since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

The rift risks weakening Orban, the champion of “illiberal democracy” who has waged a bitter fight with EU leaders over a bloc-wide Russian oil embargo, the erosion of independent judiciaries and media freedoms. Without his line to Warsaw, Orban’s effort at an alliance against the EU is fading.

The tension is over Orban’s refusal to make a clean break with President Vladimir Putin, according to officials familiar with the Polish government’s thinking. Warsaw has brought political dealings with Budapest to a halt, they said, on condition of anonymity.

“The Hungarian-Polish friendship is coming apart at the seams,” said Edit Zgut, a Hungarian political analyst in Warsaw who’s a doctoral researcher at the Polish Academy of Sciences. |