The prime minister of Sweden accuses Viktor Orban of spreading “scandalous lies”, after the Hungarian leader said that the northern country “collapses”
ULF KRISTERSSON, PHOTO: Fredrik Sandberg-tt / Shutterstock Editorial / Profimedia
Swedish Prime Minister ULF KRISTERSSON was accused of his Hungarian counterpart of spreading “scandalous lies”, after Viktor Orban said that the northern country “collapses”, as the criminal gangs would hire dozens of children as assassins, according to Reuters.
Orban, a Eurosceptic nationalist who is preparing for difficult elections in 2026, has constantly tried to mobilize his supporters by presenting a moral decline of other Western states and putting him in contrast to Hungary.
“The abandonment of traditional values, ignoring common sense and weak governance have caused barbarism to take root in the homeland of one of the greatest nations of Europe,” Orban wrote on Monday morning.
In a video published with the message, the Hungarian Prime Minister said that over 280 minors were arrested in Sweden for the crime.
The Swedish authorities recognized the existence of a problem with the violence of criminal bands and announced last week that they intend to decrease the age of criminal liability from 15 to 13 years, after more and more children have been recruited by criminal groups.
In total, eight girls between the ages of 15 and 17 were suspected of crime or murder in Sweden in 2024, according to the National Council for Crime Prevention, the Government Agency responsible for criminality statistics.
In March, Sweden announced that the rate of crimes and killings decreased significantly last year, reaching the lowest level of 2014, against the background of intensifying surveillance, which diminished the crime of bands that had led to the largest number of deaths by firearms in the European Union.
Responding to Orban's messages, the Swedish Prime Minister said that the Hungarian leader is “desperate” before next year's elections.
“These are scandalous lies. It is not surprising to come from a man who destroys the rule of law in his own country,” KrisSersson wrote on the X platform.
Orban has often been conflicted with the European Commission because of his policies on migration and measures to restrict the freedom of press and LGBTQ rights. He postponed Sweden's accession to NATO in 2022 and 2023, invoking Stockholm's criticisms to the situation of democracy and the rule of law in Hungary.
Zoltan Novak, an analyst at the Center for Leading Political Analysis, a Think Tank in Hungary, said that Sweden seems an almost random target and that Orban could have as well attack other states, such as France or Germany.
