European Parliament to debate surveillance of EU delegations in Hungary

A debate has been scheduled for next Tuesday at the European Parliament on the "The Hungarian government’s illegal espionage of EU institutions and investigative bodies". According to the agenda, representatives of both the European Commission and of the Council will be giving statements – Hungary was presiding over the latter one up until recently, having handed the baton to Poland on 1 January.

As Direkt36 reported in December in its article published on Telex, while under János Lázár's leadership in the past, the Information Office ( IO or IH in Hungarian) used to place investigators from OLAF, the EU's anti-fraud office under surveillance when they were in Hungary to investigate suspected irregularities in the tenders of Elios, after which the case developed into a secret service infighting. Elios was previously part-owned by István Tiborcz, Viktor Orbán's son-in-law. Several European Union officials have confirmed to Direkt36 that news had also reached the EU institutions about not only OLAF investigators but also other EU employees having been monitored while in Hungary. “The IH placed almost every EU delegation visiting Hungary under surveillance, including OLAF missions,” a former intelligence official said.