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Protecting Hungary's Election Integrity: Inside the Sovereignty Protection Office

• 3 Jan 2024 9:17 AM
• Hungary Matters

Hungary's new Sovereignty Protection Office will be responsible for ensuring the transparency of the upcoming local and European Parliament elections as "its first major task", Tamás Lánczi, appointed to head the new body, has said.

The new body will aim to “protect the country’s economic, cultural, communication and political identity and independence,” Lánczi told public television on Tuesday, adding that “the office will not be an authority … having primarily analytic and fact-finding tasks.”

The office “will not launch probes or impose sanctions,” he added. The office will cooperate with other agencies and “make possible violations public and report to the respective state organs,” he said, adding that the office could “call the attention of lawmakers to any legal deficiency or the need for an authority to act”.

For example, Lánczi said recipients of illegal party financing could face imprisonment but “the punishment will not be imposed by the office but by the respective state authority”.

The new office will be tasked with “preventing foreign attempts to influence the elections … and if it sees signs of such activities, it will alert the authorities,” he said.

MTI Photo: Szilárd Koszticsák

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Launched in January 2014, this newsletter published on week days covers 'everything you need to know about what’s going on in Hungary and beyond', according to its publisher the state media agency MTI.

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