[Brussels.] The European Commission will use all of its powers to ensure Hungary complies with European Union principles, Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said on Thursday.
The Commission is reviewing laws recently approved by Hungary’s Parliament to determine whether they are legally compatible with EU rules.
"We remain preoccupied that some of that legislation may indeed be in violation of European laws and European principles," Mr Barroso said, answering a question at a press conference in Denmark. "We will use all our powers to make sure that Hungary complies with the principles, the values and the rules of the European Union and I am confident that we will achieve that," he added.
Moscow (AP) - Defense Minister Marshal Georgi Zhukov said last night Soviet troops had intervened in Hungary's unrest "in the spirit of the Warsaw Pact" and could be withdrawn from that country only by common agreement among members of the Pact...Asked his position on legal justification for involvement of Soviet troops in the fighting in Budapest, in view of the Western position that the Warsaw Pact provides no such justification, Zhukov said: "That is a bad interpretation of the Pact. The spirit of the pact permits such action." [St.Petersburg Times, Oct. 30, 1956]
See previous post: Terrifying.
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Note: This blog has no political position; the new Hungarian Constitution and laws must be - as human laws always are - far from perfect. But similarities between the "spirits" of the past and those of the present cannot be forgotten when the weak and nascent Christian Spirit of Hungary is under pressure, even if indirectly; and, while the tragedy of 1956 happened on an entirely different level, the pressure applied in 2012 is as powerful as it can possibly be within the instruments and powers available to the Union at this moment in time.
The new constitutional and legal order in Hungary is not essentially Christian, improvements are bound to be needed - but its Christian aspects are not mere details in the attacks leveled against it. Let us hope that things will be sorted out "with due respect for the rights of God and Jesus Christ, our King, whose kingdom is 'a kingdom of truth and life, a kingdom of holiness and grace, a kingdom of justice, love and peace' " (cf. Pius XII, Luctuosissimi Eventus, 8), "for He is a just judge" (cf. Pius XII, Datis Nuperrime, 5). Let us also hope that the Universal Church will not remain in complicit silence when a European country that - at last! - mentions its Christian heritage in a contemporary constitutional order, as Popes have repeatedly asked for in recent decades, is under intense international pressure.
[Update - Jan. 13, 1800 GMT] Hungarian Bishops defend new Constitution (Radio Vaticana - en français).
The new constitutional and legal order in Hungary is not essentially Christian, improvements are bound to be needed - but its Christian aspects are not mere details in the attacks leveled against it. Let us hope that things will be sorted out "with due respect for the rights of God and Jesus Christ, our King, whose kingdom is 'a kingdom of truth and life, a kingdom of holiness and grace, a kingdom of justice, love and peace' " (cf. Pius XII, Luctuosissimi Eventus, 8), "for He is a just judge" (cf. Pius XII, Datis Nuperrime, 5). Let us also hope that the Universal Church will not remain in complicit silence when a European country that - at last! - mentions its Christian heritage in a contemporary constitutional order, as Popes have repeatedly asked for in recent decades, is under intense international pressure.
[Update - Jan. 13, 1800 GMT] Hungarian Bishops defend new Constitution (Radio Vaticana - en français).
