According to an opinion commissioned by several MEPs, breaches of the rule of law in the country threaten to seriously affect the protection of the European Union’s financial interests. This would be the prerequisite for a procedure.
Specifically, law professors in Hungary see a lack of transparency in the management of EU funds and the lack of an effective national law enforcement agency to investigate and prosecute fraud. It also considers that there is no effective judicial review by independent courts of the acts or omissions of the authorities dealing with the Union’s financial interests.
“This study forms the legal basis for a sanction procedure,” commented co-client Daniel Freund von den Grünen. The EU Commission only needs to put it in an envelope and send it to the Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban. The prerequisites for funding cuts are over-fulfilled.
Professor Kim Scheppele from Princeton University and Professors Daniel Kelemen from Rutgers University and John Morijn from Groningen University were involved in the report, according to Freund. It is to be officially presented this Wednesday at a press conference in Strasbourg. The German press agency had received it in advance.
