Hungarian opposition newspaper: In addition to illiberalism and support for Putin, Hungarians in the Carpathian Basin are accused of revisionism

Since the outbreak of Russian aggression against Ukraine on 24 February, Hungarian minorities in Hungary and neighboring countries have been increasingly accused of revisionism because of the Orbán government’s pro-Putin policy, reports Nepszava, quoted by Rador.

At first, feelings were stirred by the earlier apparently secret Russian-Polish-Hungarian plan to partition Transcarpathia. Politicians in the leadership of neighboring countries began to accuse the Orbán government of revisionist intentions.

Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Irina Verechuk openly formulated on behalf of the Ukrainian leadership that the Orbán government does not support sanctions against Russia and does not allow the transit of arms shipments from the West to Ukraine is that Budapest wants to get its hands on Transcarpathia.

„What do they want? Cheap Russian gas? Or, perhaps, our Transcarpathia?” asked Verechuk in March in a Facebook post.

In Slovakia Boris Kollár, the parliament speaker has become concerned about his country’s territorial integrity. On a TV show, Kollár spoke of how Victor Orbán is preparing, with the help of Russian President Vladimir Putin, to cut Slovakia into pieces.

He added that Slovakia has been receiving more threats from Hungary. „They talk about Greater Hungary, they buy real estate in our country, they hand out passports! This is no joke!” – said the populist Slovak politician, who also finds nothing wrong with Orbán’s illiberalism.

The reaction from Budapest was not without its usual arrogance. Hungarian state secretary Tamás Menczer only commented that the Slovak president had got the date wrong on the calendar and that is why Boris Kollár is being reminded that we live in the 21st century.

The same Menczer, secretary responsible for Hungary’s image, also reacted to the harsh reaction in Croatia to the Hungarian prime minister’s regular Friday morning interview in Zagreb. On Tuesday, the Croatian Foreign Ministry summoned the Hungarian ambassador in Zagreb and asked him to clarify Orbán’s claim that „there are countries that don’t have seas, we would have them too if they weren’t taken from us”.

The Hungarian Prime Minister explained why his government is resorting to a veto on the EU embargo on Russian oil. The Croatian foreign ministry interpreted this as revisionism and wrote in a statement: „Croatia condemns the statement of the Hungarian Prime Minister” (…) „We condemn any territorial claims against neighboring states.”

Tamás Menczer’s response on Facebook made the situation even worse. The state secretary claimed that „the MFA in Zagreb misunderstood something because the PM was referring to a historical fact”.

Except that the historical fact is that Hungary never had a sea, Croatia was not part of Hungary but was the autonomous partner country of the Hungarian kingdom, Fiume is a port city, and today’s Rijeka was a „corpus separatum” annexed to the Hungarian kingdom, in other words not under the territorial authority of any state or region.

But Orbán’s phrase did not only sound revisionist to Croatian foreigners, it was also appreciated as such by the international press. The independent Bucharest-based portal G4media, which cannot even be mistakenly called nationalist or anti-Hungarian, noted that „Hungarian revisionism has caused new tensions in our area”.

Croatia condemns Viktor Orbán’s claims that part of the Adriatic coastline has been taken away from Hungary, the Romanian magazine concluded.

The British magazine Bloomberg noted that Viktor Orbán „has taunted his neighbors before” with his historic claims, for example in 2020, when he posted a map of „Greater Hungary” on Facebook.

Bloomberg also refers to the fact that Viktor Orbán often presents himself as one who is the leader not only of Hungary’s nearly 10 million inhabitants but also of the „many millions” of Hungarians living in neighboring countries.

His government has granted citizenship and voting rights to Hungarians living in neighboring countries – the author recalls, adding: Orbán rejects any criticism that he harbors territorial ambitions towards other states.

But in neighboring countries, things are seen differently. In Romania, a crisis in the governing coalition is just emerging, as members of the Romanian national team from Szeklerland sang the Szekler anthem together with members of the Hungarian team at the World Hockey Championships, and Romania’s environment minister Barna Tánczos watched the game from the Hungarian side of the pitch.

In the opinion of some political leaders in the coalition, both the singing of the Szekler Anthem and the minister’s behavior are unacceptable and scandalous, and the press has already questioned whether the hockey players from Szeklerland who played under the Romanian colors really had the success of the Romanian team in their hearts.