The West unfair to Hungary

Hungary's right-wing conservative government has come in for harsh criticism across Europe on account of its new media law. The conservative daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung finds that unfair. "When former President Sólyom was in power, Hungary's constitutional court put more stress on the freedom of opinion than is normal in the West, a fact that was intentionally and unscrupulously taken advantage of by many crackpots and profiteers. For years well-known Hungarian intellectuals like Nobel Prize winner Imre kertész have complained both at home and abroad about all the monstrosities that were being published there. And now we're supposed to find it objectionable that a law has been introduced to counter just that? Those people in the West who see Orbán as a wily politician who will stop at nothing to achieve his objectives should at least grant him the political savvy not to want to isolate himself and his party in his ten-million country while the scorn of Western Europe pours over him."

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