European journalists’ organisations meeting in Budapest (Hungary) on 2-3 June 2025, on the occasion of the EFJ General Meeting (GM), denounced the ongoing crackdown by the Hungarian government on independent media, journalists and LGBTIQ people with the adoption of two resolutions.
Co-organised by the EFJ Hungarian affiliates HPU and MUOSZ, the GM took place in a context of unprecedented repression against fundamental values and freedom, as the Fidesz party of Prime Minister Viktor Orbán presented a draft of a new foreign funding bill, on 13 May. If passed, this legislation would effectively represent the first foreign agent-style law in the European Union, by blocking organisations from receiving any grant or donation from abroad and imposing considerable fines should they fail to comply with the rules.
During a roundtable on the situation of journalists and press freedom in Hungary, journalists, academic and media lawyer described the main challenges, the legal and financial pressure independent journalism face today – surviving thanks to their audience, foreign funding and public interest investigations. The European Media Freedom Act (EMFA), which is due to come into force in August 2025, was designed to safeguard media freedom and pluralism in the European Union. However, its future impact in Hungary is very much in doubt, given that the process of capturing the media has already been completed.
Over the past decade, the ruling party has gained an unprecedented influence over private and public media, allowing it to muzzle the independent press and distort the market to entrench a dominant pro-government narrative, in particular through the media controlled by the KESMA Foundation. This latest attack is designed to continue the stranglehold on the independent media in order to drive them out of business.
“The EFJ GM believes that for too long the EU has failed to prevent the Orbán government’s effort to control the country’s media and to erode media freedom and pluralism, with damaging implications for the rule of law in Hungary,” the resolution reads.
Furthermore, Hungary deepened its repression of LGBTIQ people as the parliament passed a law which curtails the right of assembly making illegal Pride and similar events, and passing an amendment to the constitution that allows the government to ban public events by LGBTIQ communities. Holding up the rainbow colours, delegates protested against this discrimination and reaffirmed their unfailing solidarity with the LGBTIQ community.
With these resolutions, the EFJ is sending a strong signal that Hungarian colleagues are not alone.
The EFJ urges the European Commission to put pressure on the Orbán government to withdraw the foreign funding bill, to sanction KESMA’s anti-competitive and market distorting behaviour, and to take further legal action against the Hungarian government for its assaults on LGBTIQ rights and freedoms of assembly and expression.
Source: EFJ
