Hello, I'm Paige, and this is the Eurointelligence podcast covering current affairs in the

EU and Eurozone. I'm joined by Wolfgang and Susanna, directors of Eurointelligence in Oxford.

The big news story this week is Hungary, which has put the EU in a serious crisis. Together

with Poland, Hungary has vetoed the EU's own resources decision, which in turn blocks the budget,

recovery fund, and any potential new rule of law mechanism. Wolfgang, which in turn blocks the budget, recovery fund, and any potential

new rule of law mechanism. Wolfgang, today you detailed how the enhanced cooperation

procedure could be one way out of this mess, but that doing something like that would take

determination and ruthlessness. You had some very, very strong words for Angela Merkel, who you

described as the mentor and patron of Victor Orban.

Why did you say that?

As we all know, the Fidesz party, Victor Orban's party, is in the EPP, and it has been Germany's

CDU and Merkel in particular, who has put a protective shield around him. So any criticism

we have for Orban, we have to direct this also at NACO. We can't

keep up the hypocrisy of pretending that she is the leader of the Western world or an icon of

liberalism, while Oban is the nasty authoritarian. The reason for why Oban is Orban and why

he can do what he does, is because the German

establishment, especially the CDU, has kept protecting him. And this is the reason why we're

not getting anywhere. The enhanced cooperation procedure should have been used from the start.

The recovery fund is not really an EU-level project. It should never have been an EU-level project

because the whole

rationale for a Eurobond, a fiscal capacity, has always been to give the monetary union a fiscal

counterpart. There is no rationale to do this on the level of the EU 27 or 28. Before, you know, while

...