George Simion, the president of the right-wing Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR), called Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán the “leader of Europe and Christian civilization,” at the Economic Forum in Karpacz.
Simion praised Orbán’s family policies and noted that numerous Transylvanian Hungarian conservatives follow him.
He also had harsh words for Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk, reports Mandiner, citing an article in Adevarul. Calling Tusk a puppet of Berlin and Ursula von der Leyen, Simion additionally made it clear that he rejected the EU’s Green Deal.
The nationalist AUR head previously told a BBC reporter after his first-round win that he was not open to discussing certain topics near and dear to the Hungarian leader, such as Hungary possibly absorbing communities in Western Romania that used to belong to “Greater Hungary” and where a large percentage of ethnic Hungarians still live today.
“Things that Viktor Orban is talking about sometimes – changing borders and quarrels that happen over things that happened 1000 years ago are not relevant,” he told Nick Thorpe.
Simion also stressed that the two countries “must unite forces and fight against illegal migration, address demographic problems, and defeat woke and other neo-Marxist ideologies that do a lot of harm to Romanians and Hungarians.”
He stressed, “whether we like it or not, we live on one land. (…) So we have to build the future together.”
There are historic tensions between Hungarians living in Romania, primarily in Transylvania, and the Romanian government, with concerns surrounding the oppression of language and other minority rights.
Last spring, after Simion won the first round of the Romanian presidential election, the president of the Democratic Alliance of Hungarians in Romania (RMDSZ), Hunor Kelemen, said, “The AUR is the one who says that there is no need for Hungarian schools, that there can only be mixed schools, that is the maximum, and that the mother tongue should be pushed back into the family community, that is where it has its place, nowhere else.”
Nicusor Dan, the progressive mayor of Bucharest, ended up winning the second round, although security expert Attila Demko posted “Thank God!” while also warning: “Simion is 39 years old, this is just the beginning for him.”
