Hungary to ban pro-democracy groups, media outlets receiving US aid

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Hungary is leading a crackdown on NGOs and media outlets operating in the country that receive funding from the US and other international sources.

An ally of US President Donald Trump, Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban said his government was going “line by line” through organisations that have received financial assistance from the US.

Under Orban, Hungary has for years enacted crackdowns on NGOs and the country’s independent media, passing laws that critics argue seek to stigmatise and hinder groups that provide protection for women and minorities, offer legal and human rights assistance, and expose official corruption.

“Now is the moment when these international networks have to be taken down, they have to be swept away,” Orban said. “It is necessary to make their existence legally impossible.”

Trump’s decision to dismantle the US Agency for International Development (USAID), the agency charged with delivering humanitarian assistance overseas, has only emboldened the Hungarian president. He has praised Trump’s slash of funding, claiming such aid had been used to fund organisations that sought to “topple” his government.