In the report Freedom in the World 2018 published last week, Freedom House has deemed Hungarian press to only be “partly free”. Hungarian think-tank Center for Fundamental Rights (AK) has highlighted the most obvious errors of said report.
“Before compiling their report, Freedom House obviously neglected to inform itself about the constitutional and public law system of Hungary”, AK writes. “As a result, the document is but a desperate attempt at influencing the European elections and ‘punishing’ states which are critical to the open society concept.”
It said that AK will on future occasions gladly assist Freedom House in getting their facts right as “no reasonable person can honestly think that Senegal, Botswana, South Africa or India are more free than Hungary”.
AK said the report brings unjustified criticism to the State Audit Office for scrutinizing the finances of opposition parties and to public service media for its attitude towards opposition politicians “when in fact both organizations were only performing their legal duties”.
It also said that the Freedom House also wrongly stated that the government is the one who appoints the members of the Constitutional Court or in its assessment of the 2018 elections which is based on “grave factual errors”.
