Hungary’s Orbán launches EU election campaign with pledge to ‘occupy Brussels’

BUDAPEST, Hungary (AP) — Hungary’s prime minister has portrayed Europe as a continent teetering on the edge of armed conflict in a speech opening his party’s campaign for European Union elections. Viktor Orbán, Hungary’s right-wing populist leader, told members of his Fidesz party on Friday that a changing of the guard among EU leaders was necessary to prevent the bloc’s countries from being drawn into the war in Ukraine. The long-serving Orbán goes into EU elections in June facing significant challenges at home and abroad, including the recent resignations of senior Hungarian officials and an economy struggling under the weight of billions in funding the EU has withheld over rule-of-law and corruption concerns.