Hungary Retreats, NGOs No Longer Have To Report Sponsors

Hungary has scrapped a regulation that required non-governmental organizations (NGOs) to disclose their sponsors to the government, a big retreat on the part of Budapest, Deutsche Presse-Agentur (dpa) reported.

The regulation was introduced only a fortnight ago. Late on Friday evening, the annulment of the two relevant paragraphs appeared in the Hungarian Official Gazette. Last week, Hungary's Minister of the Chancellery Gergely Gulyas had said that the regulation was not EU-compliant, so it would be changed.

Already in May this year, Hungary's parliament had overturned a law discriminating against NGOs following a ruling by the European Court of Justice (ECJ.) According to that law, NGOs that receive donations from abroad had to include a note in all their publications and websites identifying them as "organizations supported from abroad."

Hungary's right-wing nationalist government under Viktor Orban sees foreign influence and funding behind anti-government associations.

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