Investigation in Hungary after accusations that it was transmitting to Russia what EU leaders were talking about. Szijjarto: “Foreign secret services tapped my phone”
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban on Monday ordered an investigation into what he called a wiretapping of his foreign minister, the move comes as his government faces harsh criticism after being accused of passing information to Moscow from the EU's highest level.
“We are dealing with two serious problems: there is evidence that Hungary's foreign minister was wiretapped, and we also have clues as to who might be behind this. This must be investigated immediately,” Orban wrote on Twitter on Monday, according to Reuters.
The new development comes after the Washington Post reported on Saturday, citing a European security official, that Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto had for years made regular phone calls during breaks in EU meetings to update his Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov, with “live reports of what was discussed.”
Szijjarto on Sunday denied the claims in the article, saying it was “fake news”. A government spokesman did not respond to a request for comment.
Investigative journalist, accused by a conservative publication
On Monday, a conservative Hungarian news channel, Mandiner, published an article and an audio file in which investigative journalist Szabolcs Panyi talks to a source and says he gave “a state body of an EU country” two phone numbers that Szijjarto used to make calls.
Also on Monday, on his Facebook page, Panyi confirmed that the discussion took place. He said he used the numbers to compare them with information received from a European country's security service for an investigative article on Szijjarto's transfer of information to Russia.
Panyi told Reuters that the government used secret service methods to reveal information about a source's communications when he was investigating an “unpleasant matter” for authorities.
Szijjarto: “I was intercepted”
Szijjarto said the Mandiner report was “shocking”.
“It is amazing that with the active cooperation of a Hungarian journalist, one or more foreign intelligence services tapped my phone,” Szijjarto said in a Facebook video.
Szijjarto has made frequent visits to Moscow since the start of the Ukraine war in 2022. On March 4, he met with President Vladimir Putin to discuss, among other issues, Hungary's oil supply.
Orban cultivated cordial relations with Putin despite the war in Ukraine and maintained Hungary's heavy dependence on Russian oil and gas. Last week, Orban, citing a dispute with Kiev over a war-damaged pipeline, blocked the implementation of an EU loan to Ukraine agreed back in December.
Nationalist Orban, in power since 2010, will face his toughest re-election campaign in 16 years on April 12, as the centre-right opposition Tisza party leads most polls by a wide margin.
