Hungarian authorities said on Thursday they had launched an investigation into a journalist over accusations that he was spying for Ukraine amid an increasingly acrimonious election campaign - allegations dismissed by the reporter.
Nationalist Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, who has kept close ties with Russia during Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, is fighting to extend his 16 years in office in the face of an unprecedented challenge from a centre-right opposition party.
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On Thursday, Orbán’s chief of staff told a briefing that journalist Szabolcs Panyi, who has been investigating the government’s ties to Moscow, was a spy working for Ukraine.
“More and more Ukrainian spies are uncovered in the country. The first of them is Szabolcs Panyi, who was discovered ... to have spied against his home country in collusion with a foreign state,” Gergely Gulyas said.
Government spokesperson Zoltan Kovacs said a formal investigation has been launched into the journalist. Police did not immediately respond to emailed questions from Reuters.
Panyi dismissed the accusation.
“Accusing investigative journalists of espionage is entirely unprecedented in the 21st century from a European Union member state,” Panyi wrote on his Facebook page.
“This is truly characteristic of Putin’s Russia, Belarus and similar regimes.”
Panyi is an investigative journalist who works for the Hungarian non-profit investigative outlet Direkt36 and Warsaw-based Vsquare.org.
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