Head of Hungarian Institute of International Affairs dismissed with immediate effect

The Hungarian Ministry of Foreign Affairs is terminating Botond Feledy’s mandate as director general at the Hungarian Institute of International Affairs with immediate effect, György László Velkey, the ministry’s state secretary announced on Facebook late Monday evening.

He justified the dismissal by stating that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs “learned a few days ago that the leader of the Hungarian Institute of International Affairs had a working relationship with the previous government for several years up until this spring”, which led to the loss of trust towards Feledy.

A few hours prior to his dismissal, Telex had sent questions on the subject to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, after having confirmed through a public records request that Botond Feledy had served as an advisor to the Orbán government’s Minister of Construction and Transport, János Lázár in recent years. According to the ministry's response, Botond Feledy’s company, Red Snow, had a contract with Lázár’s ministry from December 2023 until the change of government. During this period, under three separate contracts, the ministry paid Red Snow a total of 84 million 215,500 forints (€230,780) for its services.

Shortly after Velkey’s announcement, Feledy reacted by saying that his goal had always been to build a foreign policy analysis firm that everyone could trust. “I set out to translate complex global political situations into terms that my clients could understand. We never provided consulting or engaged in domestic political maneuvering; instead, we worked to produce analyses of the global political landscape,” he wrote. According to him, his clients have never influenced his opinions, and he will continue to “work with a clear conscience” to facilitate Hungary's transition to democracy.

Prime Minister Péter Magyar explained the decision as follows: “It was a difficult decision, but it was made quickly. It was difficult because Botond Feledy is widely recognised as an excellent professional”. He then went on to explain that the decision was made quickly because no one can hold a leadership position under the Tisza administration “who concealed the fact that he had received 84 million in public funds from the previous government—specifically from János Lázár—(and that without a public procurement process).

Magyar added that there is nothing wrong with someone having worked as a professional transparently and at a fair price for the previous government, and in his view, being a member of Fidesz is no reason for disqualification either. “The problem arises when someone receives tens of millions in public funds in a non-transparent manner and then conceals this information during their hiring process. Not to mention the question of why the Minister of Transportation even needed such analyses for three million forints a month.”

“Many of us used to be members of Fidesz, myself included. Several of us even worked under the previous government for varying lengths of time. However, this information—whether about me or any of my colleagues in a similar situation—was already public knowledge. We never made a secret of it.”

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced in early August that Botond Feledy would be appointed as the director general of the Hungarian Institute of International Affairs. Minister Anita Orbán said at the time that the new leadership would promote thorough, independent, and forward-looking research. Upon his appointment, Feledy said that he felt his career until then had prepared him for accepting the offer.

“I said yes because it is a tremendous opportunity and an honor to be able to support an entire country’s foreign affairs apparatus with the work of dozens of researchers,”

he said. Due to his new assignment, Feledy moved back to Budapest from Brussels with his Hungarian wife and their children.

Botond Feledy is a foreign policy expert and analyst, podcast host, and was for four years the author of the global politics newsletter HetiFeledy produced in collaboration with the independent outlet Partizán. His research and professional work primarily focus on Euro-Atlantic security policy, information warfare, and cybersecurity.

He previously served as the director of the European Leadership Program in Brussels and as the managing director of Red Snow Consulting. He also taught courses on international relations at the Faculty of Law and Political Sciences at ELTE University in Budapest and at the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences at PPKE, and spent a semester teaching at the Sciences Po campus in Dijon. Until 2017, he served as director of the St. Ignatius Jesuit College in Budapest, and in the early 2010s he headed the international affairs editorial department at the Hungarian news agency, MTI.