Orban announces new far-right alliance with Austrian and Czech parties

The European Patriots alliance will unite Orban’s conservative Fidesz party, Austria’s far-right Freedom Party (FPÖ) and the Action Party of Disaffected Citizens (ANO), led by the Czech Republic’s billionaire former Prime Minister Andrej Babis.

Orban expressed confidence that new members would soon join the alliance, which would become “the largest right-wing group in Europe.”

On Monday, Hungary will take over the rotating presidency of the European Union for six months.

Hungary’s prime minister said at an event in Vienna on Sunday that “Europeans want three things: peace, order and development,” declaring that “we get war, immigration and stagnation from the Brussels elite.”

Austria’s Freedom Party leader Herbert Kickel said the new European Parliament will hold its first meeting in Strasbourg on July 16 and promised that the number of parties that want to join the newly formed political force has exceeded everyone’s expectations, but he did not name possible partners. The leaders of the three parties did not answer questions.

The “Patriotic Declaration on the Future of Europe” signed by the leaders of the three parties criticized plans for a possible “Central European State” and pledged “sovereignty over federalism, freedom over dictatorship and peace over peace.”

Until 2021, Fidesz operated within the center-right European People’s Party, but Orbán decided to withdraw. Since then, his party has not participated in official political groups. Fidesz won the European Parliament elections, winning 11 of Hungary’s 21 mandates, but this is two less than the current European Parliament.

The Freedom Party, which has so far operated within the “Identity and Democracy” (ID) faction, won the Austrian European Parliament elections and hopes to win the national parliamentary elections on September 29. In the European Parliament elections, the party won six of Austria’s 20 seats, improving its 2019 performance by three seats.

The United Nations, operating under the leadership of the liberal-centric political group Renew Europe, has so far won the European Parliament elections in the Czech Republic and won seven of the Czech Republic’s 21 seats, one more than five years ago.

The European Parliament elections were held in early June. In them, the far right achieved considerable success, but their ability to work together has been questioned. So far, they have been operating in two groups in the European Parliament, and many parties have not yet joined any group.