BRUSSELS (Reuters) – The European Union executive said on Wednesday it was waiting for a final step from Hungary to unlock Budapest’s access to billions of euros hitherto frozen over concerns Prime Minister Viktor Orban had damaged democratic checks-and-balances.
The European Commission said Hungary’s latest judicial reforms must first be published in the country’s official journal to be fully enacted, which would then allow the Brussels-based executive to unfreeze up to 10 billion euros in development aid for Budapest from the bloc’s shared budget.
The bloc had hoped unlocking the money would help sway Orban. But his senior aide bid for up to 30 billion euros in comments to Bloomberg on Tuesday.
On Wednesday, the Commission responded by raising the stakes further as the EU is locked in a deepening tug-of-war with Hungary over support to Ukraine, which Orban threatens to veto at a summit of the bloc’s leaders in Brussels on Thursday and Friday.
(Reporting by Benoir van Overstraeten and Gabriela Baczynska, writing by Piotr Lipinski)
