After a bitterly fought election campaign overshadowed by Russia's invasion of Ukraine, the EU’s less than transparent and democratic financial conditionality mechanism took effect in Hungary. There was plenty for the corruption watchdog K-Monitor to do in 2022! In an environment where the most…

2022 has been a turbulent year for asset declaration rules in Hungary. The government has repeatedly amended the way in which lawmakers and government leaders are required to declare their incomes and assets. While the head of the Authority for Data Protection and Freedom of Information criticized…

The public interest management foundations (in short: public interest trusts - PITs) were set up by the Hungarian government in 2021 to restructure Hungarian higher education. Although the law on PITs has been amended several times in the context of the conditionality procedure launched by the…

After the pre-election year of 2021, which was all about the ruling party's stocking up, 2022 did not bring more integrity into public life in Hungary either. There was plenty for the corruption watchdog K-Monitor to do! In the spring, we intensively followed the controversial parliamentary election…

K-Monitor as one of nine Hungarian NGOs has submitted a report on rule of law in Hungary to the European Commission. The report assesses the rule of law situation in Hungary and draws attention to problems in the justice, the anti-corruption framework, the media and other rule of law related…

K-Monitor is happy to announce that our NER Hotel database is now available in English, too. NER Hotel is a map-based website that aims to make the Hungarian tourism sector more transparent by uncovering the real owners of restaurants, hotels, and other leisure establishments. It is designed to help…

Promises and half-hearted solutions have failed to convince the European Commission, and so Hungary has still no access to vital EU funds. According to the Hungarian Helsinki Committee, K-Monitor and Transparency International (TI) Hungary, the Hungarian government must seize the last opportunity to…

A number of international outlets reported that the EU Commission will likely maintain its proposal to freeze EU cohesion funds for Hungary. At the same time it is also expected that the EU will approve Hungary's recovery plan, still not available publicly, while connecting payments to strict…

With the 19 November deadline given to the Hungarian government to enact the remedial measures it committed to in the framework of the conditionality mechanism nearing, the Hungarian Helsinki Committee, K-Monitor and Transparency International Hungary prepared a new joint analysis on the…

In our publications about the Hungarian Government’s recent steps against corruption, we already referred to the fact that the 17 measures agreed on by the European Commission (EC) and the Hungarian Government neither cover several corruption related issues raised earlier by the EC when preparing…