The diplomatic tit-for-tat between the United States and Hungary continues over a report published by the US State Department on Monday which found that there are serious human rights problems in Hungary.
Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó reacted to the document in a video, asking "how do they come up with this?" – calling the findings outrageous and shocking.
It didn't take long for a response to arrive: the US ambassador in Budapest, David Pressman, sent a message to Szijjártó on Twitter. "It's a familiar situation", he said, adding that the Kremlin similarly dismisses criticism over human rights abuses in Russia.
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David Pressman, the new US ambassador arrived to Hungary in early September last year. In a departure from diplomatic protocol, the Hungarian government only sent a department head to welcome him, instead of a customary reception by a state secretary.
The diplomat, who represented the United States as ambassador to the UN Security Council under Democrat president Barack Obama from 2014 to 2017 was nominated for the post by President Joe Biden in May. The Senate voted 61-30 in favour of his nomination, meaning that 11 of the 50 Republican senators also approved his appointment. At the Senate hearing, Pressmand said that “Hungary is a declining democracy and Russian influence over the Hungarian government must be confronted”, citing the influence of China as a worrying trend as well.
Upon arrival, he got to work immediately.
His actions have also caught the attention of Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, so much so that he devoted a special section to him and the United States in his annual State of the Nation address on 18 February, saying:
"President Biden has sent a "press-man", (Pressman) as ambassador instead of a good friend", (former Chargé' D' Affaires, André Goodfriend – TN) but it would be good to avoid sending someone called "Puccini" next"
– suggesting an intention in US politics to trigger some kind of coup d' état ("puccs" in Hungarian) in Hungary.
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