Serbia and Hungary: Hammering Democracy

Hungary is currently Serbia’s closest international partner. Bilateral relations between the two countries are no longer marred by any disputes and their political and economic interests increasingly coincide. The values underpinning the administrations of both countries have converged to such an extent that a similar modus operandi is evident in their attitudes to issues such as democracy, the rule of law, institutions, foreign policy priorities, political opposition, the media, non-governmental organisations and the migrant crisis.

The author of the analysis offers a brief overview of the political and economic cooperation between the two countries. In addition, the document offers an analysis of the characteristics of their policies, which have become increasingly similar in recent years. Some of the common characteristics are:

• Capture of the media by the authorities is characteristic shared by these two countries.
• Both countries have created an extremely hostile political environment for their NGOs.

• Serbia’s migrant policy is increasingly following the Hungarian model.

In the analysis it is concluded that Serbia should develop and nurture the best possible relations with all of its neighbours for political, economic, ethnic, cultural and other reasons. It is stated that Hungary is important for Serbia because of historical and unbreakable family and human bonds and that it is unacceptable that the governments of these two countries are using bilateral cooperation to consolidate their own power, to destroy democracy and dismantle the liberal order.