European Commission’s Rule of Law Report Draws Criticism from Hungary and Poland
The Commission report will be tied to how EU funds are disbursed. (Wikimedia Commons)
The European Commission (EC) published its first Rule of Law Report evaluating democratic standards in the 27 EU member states on September 30. The report listed concerns regarding corruption and anti-democratic practices in several Eastern European countries, highlighting Poland and Hungary as the most severe examples.
The document covered four categories: the justice system, anti-corruption framework, media pluralism, and institutional checks and balances. Poland received 30 mentions of “concerns” or “serious concerns” in the report, more than any other country. It was followed by Bulgaria with 19 areas of concern, Austria with 16, Romania with 15, and Hungary with 12.
The report serves as a “preventative” measure to identify issues in member states early on so that they can be addressed with proper EU intervention, according to EC Vice President for Values and Transparency Vera Jourová. Jourová said that the EC “listened to the calls from Poland and Hungary who for a long time were telling us, ‘Look at other member states, compare all the systems.’”
Warsaw, which was accused of discrimination against women, LGBTQ+ communities, and ethnic minorities in the report, reacted negatively to the evaluation. Polish Justice Minister Zbigniew Ziobro called the document an attack on the Polish democracy and threatened to cut Poland’s EU funding in response. Ziobro stated that the EU’s criticism disrespects conservative and Roman Catholic views, calling it part of a constant slew of attacks from the left.
Jourová also stated that Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán is building a flawed democracy, drawing criticism from Hungarian Justice Minister Judit Varga, who demanded that she resign. Budapest repeatedly questioned the validity of the EC’s methodology and called the report “fallacious” and “absurd.”
Warsaw and Budapest plan to jointly create a rule of law institute to independently evaluate the state of democracy in the EU and combat “double standards.” In a joint press conference with Polish counterpart Zbigniew Rau, Hungarian Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó stated that they have “had enough of some Western European politicians using us as a punchbag” and that previous concerns over rule of law in Poland and Hungary were a “means of extortion.”
The EC report is expected to impact the future disbursement of EU funds, as Western European powers seek to link payouts to each state’s level of respect for the rule of law. Hungary and Poland have repeatedly rejected past proposals of such a plan, but a compromise plan proposed by Germany, despite tempering the language, is seen as a potential major step toward uniform democratic standards across the EU.