The News Caravan

Tag: Věra Jourová

  • Hungary’s Viktor Orbán plays spoilsport on NATO accession for Finland, Sweden

    Hungary’s Viktor Orbán plays spoilsport on NATO accession for Finland, Sweden

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    Hungary’s reputation as the troublemaker of Europe will be burnished on Wednesday as its parliament begins debating a contentious issue: whether to give Finland and Sweden the green light to join NATO.

    Along with Turkey, Hungary has yet to ratify the applications of Finland and Sweden to join the transatlantic defense alliance more than eight months after NATO leaders signed off on their membership bid at a summit in Madrid.

    While NATO members are more concerned about the potential of Turkey to stonewall accession for the Nordic countries — President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has been blocking Sweden’s application, alleging that Stockholm is harboring Kurdish militants — the government of Viktor Orbán has also been dragging its heels on parliamentary approval for the process.

    Hungary’s ratification process will finally begin on Wednesday, with a debate due to kick off in the parliament in Budapest ahead of a vote — expected in the second half of March.

    But already, there are signs of trouble ahead.

    Máté Kocsis, head of Orbán’s nationalist Fidesz party caucus in parliament, said last week that a “serious debate” had now emerged over the accession of the two countries. Hungary now plans to send a delegation to Sweden and Finland to examine “political disputes” that have arisen.

    Orbán himself echoed such views. The Hungarian leader, who has an iron grip on his Fidesz party, said in an interview on Friday that “while we support Sweden and Finland’s accession to NATO in principle, we first need to have some serious discussions.”

    He pointed to Finland and Sweden’s previous criticism of Hungary’s record on rule-of-law issues, asserting that some in his party are questioning the wisdom of admitting countries that are “spreading blatant lies about Hungary, about the rule of law in Hungary, about democracy, about life here.”

    “How, this argument runs, can anyone want to be our ally in a military system while they’re shamelessly spreading lies about Hungary?”

    Orbán’s comments have confirmed fears in Brussels that the Hungarian leader could try to use his leverage over NATO enlargement to extract concessions on rule-of-law issues. 

    Finland and Sweden have been among the most critical voices around the EU table over rule-of-law concerns in Hungary, with Budapest still locked in a dispute with the European Union over the disbursal of funds due to Brussels’ protests over its democratic standards. 

    European Commission Vice-President Věra Jourová said earlier this month that Hungary must sort out the independence of its judiciary “very soon” if it wants to receive €5.8 billion in grants due from the EU’s COVID-19 recovery fund. 

    Helsinki and Stockholm have kept largely silent on the looming vote in Budapest, reflecting in part a reluctance to stir up controversy ahead of time.

    Sweden, in particular, has been treading a fine line with Turkey, seeking not to alienate Erdoğan even as allies now acknowledge the possibility of the two countries joining at different times — an apparent acceptance that Erdoğan could further hold up Sweden’s bid. 

    NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg visited Helsinki Monday, where Finland’s push to join the alliance topped the agenda. He urged both Turkey and Hungary to confirm the membership bids — and soon. 

    “I hope that they will ratify soon,” Stoltenberg said of the Hungarian parliament’s discussions. Asked if he was in contact with Hungary on the issue, he replied that it was a decision for sovereign national parliaments, adding: “The time has come. Finland meets all the criteria, as does Sweden. So we are working hard, and the aim is to have this in place as soon as possible.”



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    ( With inputs from : www.politico.eu )

  • Don’t use TikTok, Dutch officials are told

    Don’t use TikTok, Dutch officials are told

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    Public authorities in the Netherlands are being told to steer clear of TikTok amid growing concerns across the EU and U.S. that the Chinese-owned video-sharing platform poses privacy risks.

    Dutch ministries and agencies are mostly following a recommendation to shun TikTok accounts and stop government communication and advertising on the platform, two government officials told POLITICO. This is despite the app’s skyrocketing popularity in the Netherlands, where it has around 3.5 million users.

    The Dutch pivot away from TikTok follows advice issued by the general affairs ministry to “suspend the use of TikTok for the government until TikTok has adjusted its data protection policy” announced in November. While the recommendation resembles a recent U.S. government decision from December to ban the use of TikTok on government devices, the Dutch guidance is far more limited in scope and enforcement.

    It’s the latest example of how TikTok, owned by the Beijing-headquartered ByteDance, is facing headwinds in Europe, adding to its troubles in the U.S. The firm is already under investigation for sending data on European Union users to China. One of the video app’s fiercest European critics is French President Emmanuel Macron, who has called TikTok “deceptively innocent” and a cause of “real addiction” among users, as well as a source of Russian disinformation. 

    Dutch officials have sought to strengthen ties with Washington in recent months as the U.S. pushes for more export controls on selling sensitive technology to China, including machines made by Dutch chips printing giant ASML. Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte this month met with U.S. President Joe Biden, where they discussed how to “quite frankly, meet the challenges of China,” the U.S. leader told reporters ahead of the meeting.

    The Dutch policy on TikTok, which is effectively a pause rather than a ban, is mainly targeted at stopping the use of TikTok for “media” purposes, a spokesperson for the general affairs ministry said, and doesn’t explicitly instruct government officials to delete the app from phones.

    The spokesperson said it’s hard to evaluate how strictly government services have abided by the advice since the ministry isn’t monitoring separate services’ use of the app. But the two officials said the advice had triggered a clear shift away from the Chinese-owned app, in line with growing security concerns across the West.

    A junior Dutch government coalition party called in November for a full ban on the app “in its current form.” Asked by reporters what he thought of this proposal, Rutte said this was “the opinion of five seats in the Dutch lower chamber.”

    TikTok admitted in early November that some of its China-based employees could access European TikTok user data. It also came under intense scrutiny in the U.S. over a report in Forbes magazine in December that employees had accessed data to track the location of journalists covering TikTok.

    This month, TikTok Chief Executive Shou Zi Chew visited Brussels to assuage concerns in meetings with EU commissioners including Executive Vice President Margrethe Vestager, Vice President for Values Věra Jourová and Justice Commissioner Didier Reynders.

    “I count on TikTok to fully execute its commitments to go the extra mile in respecting EU law and regaining [the] trust of European regulator,” Jourová said in a warning shot at the company. There could not be “any doubt that data of users in Europe are safe and not exposed to illegal access from third-country authorities,” she said.

    TikTok said in a comment that it’s open to engaging with the Dutch government “to debunk misconceptions and explain how we keep both our community and their data safe and secure.”

    UPDATED: This article was updated to add TikTok’s comment.



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    ( With inputs from : www.politico.eu )