BUDAPEST, Hungary — China and Russia seek “to erode freedom” in Central European nations once dominated by the Soviet Union, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo cautioned Monday in Hungary’s capital.
“Russia and China are authoritarian powers who do not share our joint aspirations of freedom,” Pompeo said during a joint press conference with Hungarian foreign minister Peter Szijjarto.
Pompeo’s visit to Hungary, the first by a U.S. secretary of state in nearly eight years, comes as U.S. and NATO powers worry about the economic and diplomatic clout wielded on the continent by their competitors to the east. Pompeo set the stage for his remarks by visiting a statue of Ronald Reagan earlier in the day.
“We must not let Putin drive wedges between friends in NATO. Hungarians know all too well from their history that an authoritarian Russia will never be a friend to the freedom and sovereignty of smaller nations,” Pompeo said. “Russia’s not the only power that wants to erode freedom in this region. I raised with Peter today the dangers of allowing China to gain a bridgehead in Hungary, and we talked openly about how we might work together on that issue.”
While calling Pompeo’s visit a “true honor,” his Hungarian counterpart suggested that such collaboration wasn’t a given.
“We are NATO allies,” Szijjarto said. “When it comes to cooperation with Russia or cooperation with the People’s Republic of China, that doesn’t endanger us being a reliable partner to the United States and to NATO.”
Their public display of friendship didn’t stop the diplomats from trading rebukes and warnings wrapped in compliments. Pompeo celebrated the signing of a defense cooperation agreement with the NATO member-state, while Szijjarto, whose government, under Prime Minister Viktor Orban, is the staunchest opponent of migration within the European Union, stressed that Orban and Trump have the “same stance in general questions” with their shared belief that “national interest is first,” as he put it through a translator. “There’s been a rapid improvement or a rebuilding of our political ties,” Szijjarto said.
Such rhetoric was to be expected from Hungary, given Orban’s desire for powerful friends in the face of European distaste for his record on press freedom and the rule of law. Pompeo held meetings with opposition figures earlier in the day and alluded to their concerns at the press conference, saying, “I met with Hungarian civil society leaders as well to talk about the importance of protecting and strengthening democratic institutions throughout the Western world.” He announced the State Department would undertake “new initiatives” in the region aimed at “increasing support for people-to-people ties, events, and exchanges” — an implicit retort to Orban’s crackdown on foreign-funded nonprofit organizations, most notably groups funded by liberal American billionaire George Soros.
“It is consistent with both the United States and Hungary’s mission,” Pompeo said. “It’s every ally’s responsibility to keep Europe free — just as Hungary did in 1948, 1956, and 1989.”
Pompeo trumpeted renewed ties between the two nations: “Americans and Hungarians have always stood together in the pursuit of freedom, and that tradition continues today, which is why I am so proud of the American engagement in this country in the Trump administration.” But the Hungarians might ultimately rebuff the American advance. “We think the world is not going to be a better place if some countries spend their time by intervening in other countries or lecturing other countries,” Szijjarto said. He was explaining why Hungary would vote against any EU condemnation of the United States, but the remark echoed Orban’s pro-China rhetoric.
“It has become increasingly offensive that a few developed countries have been continuously lecturing most of the world on human rights, democracy, development, and the market economy. Everyone has had enough of this, and of these the Chinese are the strongest,” Orban said in 2017. He argued that Chinese investment abroad “is specifically built on mutual acceptance: There is no teacher and no student.”
Pompeo contradicted that optimistic outlook Monday with a stark warning: “There’s an experience of states in the Asia-Pacific region that shows that Beijing’s handshake sometimes comes with strings — strings that will leave Hungary indebted both economically and politically.”
