Hungary: Victor Orban meets Pope on Thursday

Nationalist Prime Minister Victor Orban will travel to the Vatican on Thursday for a meeting with Pope Francis, his first foreign trip since winning a landslide victory in the Assembly elections in early April. “My first official visit after the election will take me to see the Vatican pope tomorrow,” the president wrote on his Facebook page Wednesday.

Both have the opposite view of religion: Mr. Orban, from a Calvinist background, shows his commitment to “Christian Europe” to justify his anti-immigration policy, while the sovereign pope makes it a duty to do a welcome good. Believer. Franுவாois’ commitment to refugees led him to be frequently referred to as “credin” or “an idiot” by the media close to the government.

The spiritual leader of the 1.3 billion Catholics who came to Budapest in September 2021 to preside over the closing conference of the International Charity Congress met with the Prime Minister on this occasion and called on the Hungarians to be “open” to all.

Victor Orban, accused by Brussels of carrying out several attacks on the rule of law, won for the fourth time in a row and won a comfortable majority in parliament. He has reserved his first visit to his Polish ally in the past. But while the leader, who has approached Russian President Vladimir Putin since 2010, is keen to stay out of the conflict, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine highlights differences between the two countries.