Europe

Orban and Austrian and Czech populists push for a third far-right group in the European Parliament

Orban and Austrian and Czech populists push for a third far-right group in the European Parliament

Patriots for Europe. That is the name of the third far-right group in the European Parliament founded this Sunday by the three large populist and nationalist parties of Hungary, Austria and the Czech Republic, led by the Magyar Prime Minister, Viktor Orban.

“The aim is for this group to soon be the strongest right-wing group in the European Parliament,” Orban said on Sunday, as the country assumes the rotating presidency of the European Council from Monday.

The new far-right group in the European Parliament is made up of the ruling Hungarian party Faiththe Austrian opposition liberal party FPÖ and the Czech opposition party Alliance of Disgruntled Citizens (YEAR). However, it still needs the support of at least four other formations.

The three founding parties were the winners of the recent elections in their respective countries. European elections.

The three have in common the defense of a restrictive immigration policy in the EU, lifting the future European ban on vehicles with combustion engines, in addition to reviewing the so-called “green new pact” for the ecological transformation of the European economy.

Together with Orbán, they signed the call “patriotic manifesto” FPÖ leader Herbert Kickland the leader of ANO and former Czech Prime Minister, the tycoon Andrej Babis.

The three hope that after this announcement the new far-right group in the European Parliament will become a “carrier rocket” to attract other European formations to their cause.

History books will decide the importance of today“In a few years we will see how important today was, when European policy began to change,” Orbán argued.

Regarding the war in Ukraine, the Hungarian leader stated that “Europeans want three things: peace, order and development. But what they have received from the Brussels elites is war, migration and stagnation.”

Babis, who has just left the liberal faction in the European Parliament, spoke of three “big priorities”: strengthen the sovereignty of EU countries, truly solve the migration problem and urgently review the green new deal.

Regarding environmental policy, Orbán noted that “what is happening now in Brussels “It is not a green policy, but a poisonous green policy.”. “They are not curing us, but poisoning,” said the Hungarian leader.

The three parties gathered this Sunday have together 24 MEPs (Fidesz 11, ANO 7 and FPÖ 6), i.e. one more than the minimum of 23 to form a faction in the European Parliament. In any case,need that more parties from four different European countries join together to formalise this parliamentary alliance.

If successful, Patriots for Europe would be the third faction with a radical right orientation in the Strasbourg Parliament, along with Identity and Democracy (ID) and European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR).

The deadline to register the members of the new parliamentary faction expires next Wednesday, July 3, while the constituent session of the European Parliament is scheduled for July 16.

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