Amid the furore over Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s visit to Tbilisi immediately after the allegedly stolen October 26 general election, a visit by the country’s President Tamas Sulyok to Serbia drew relatively little attention. But the visit was still significant: Both Georgia and Serbia are among several of the EU candidate countries with which Orban is actively building relations. 

The Hungarian prime minister has been working with potential future EU members who share his illiberal worldview. With the election defeat of Poland’s Law and Justice (PiS) party last year, Orban lost a crucial ally within the EU. Although he shares some ideological ground with leaders such as Italy’s Giorgia Meloni and Slovakia’s Robert Fico, Orban is increasingly focused on engaging countries that may join the EU in the coming years or decades. 

Orban is thus playing a long game, building alliances with with candidate countries whose leaders hold similar views in the hope of welcoming them into the bloc in future — thus helping to shift the balance away from the liberal values Orban rejects.

Accordingly, Orban has forged close ties with Serbia’s President Aleksandar Vucic, North Macedonia’s right-wing VMRO-DPMNE party, Bosnia & Herzegovina’s Serb leader Milorad Dodik, and the Georgian Dream government in Tbilisi. These relationships all suggest Orban’s aim is to anchor a network of like-minded leaders, who are suitably grateful to Hungary for its support with their accession, that will help reshape the EU from within once they accede.

Undermining democracy 

One of the criticisms levelled against Orban has been his deliberate weakening of democracy at home within Hungary, at the same time as encouraging leaders from EU enlargement candidates to act in a similar manner. 

This approach was evident during the Hungarian prime minister’s visit to Tbilisi on October 28-29, only days after Georgian Dream claimed victory in an election that has been widely criticised as rigged. Georgian Dream, under the leadership of billionaire Bidzina Ivanishvili, won 54% of the vote, though opposition leaders rejected the official results. Tens of thousands protested in Tbilisi on October 28, following President Salome Zourabichvili’s condemnation of the election as a “Russian special operation”.

There was no such criticism from Orban, who described the election as being “in all respects positive, free, democratic”. 

He went on to explicitly undermine the criticism made by fellow leaders of EU member states as well as top European officials such as European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and foreign policy chief Josep Borrell. 

“The results of the elections are indisputable. Free and democratic elections have been held, but there will still be disputes and arguments in Europe, you should not take it seriously,” Orban said at a joint press conference alongside his Georgian opposite number Irakli Kobakhidze. 

“This is a common story, there is a similar debate in Brussels. It's always like that. When inherently conservative parties win, we always see this kind of argument, because European politics is based on a manual. If the liberals win, then there is democracy, if the conservatives win, then there was no democracy.” 

Orban also echoed one of the key messages of Georgian Dream’s campaign, namely that the Georgian ruling party is a guarantor of peace for the country, as by rebuilding relations with Moscow it will avoid the country being plunged back into another disastrous war with Russia. This resonated with a population made fearful by the ongoing war in nearby Ukraine, as well as Georgia’s own recent experience of war with Russia in 2008. “We understand the decision that the Georgian people made and they chose peace,” he said. 

The Russia factor

The Russia issue cannot be ignored. Orban is widely seen as the EU leader closest to Moscow — and the only one apart from Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer to have met Russian President Vladimir Putin since the invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Georgian Dream, despite its public statements on EU integration, is perceived by the opposition as moving Georgia back into Russia’s sphere of influence.

Dodik’s pro-Russian leanings are well-known; he is a regular traveller to Russia and an outspoken fan of Putin. Serbia’s leadership has taken a more balanced course, maintaining its ties with Moscow and refusing to impose sanctions, at the same time as it pursues its EU membership ambitions. While top Serbian officials insist the country’s primary foreign policy goal is EU membership, there have been frequent calls from MEPs and other European politicians for Serbia’s accession progress to be frozen until it aligns with EU foreign policy. 

Long-term alliances

Orban’s strongest connections among leading politicians from EU candidate countries have historically been with Vucic and Dodik. 

Now, the Hungarian prime minister has been expanding his influence among other accession candidates, embracing the new right-wing government in Skopje and showing clear public support for Georgian Dream in the face of condemnation by other EU leaders.

Serbia and Hungary’s close relationship was celebrated during Sulyok’s visit to Belgrade in late October, when Vucic commented that it had reached “unprecedented heights”. 

The leaders discussed EU accession and joint infrastructure projects, including the Belgrade-Budapest high-speed railway. Vucic lauded Hungary as a “sincere friend”, while noting Hungary’s critical role in Serbia’s EU integration process.

Hungary has been particularly instrumental in supporting Serbia’s infrastructure and energy sectors, including an oil pipeline between the two countries. Bilateral trade has surged, with Hungary now ranking as Serbia’s fourth-largest trade partner. Budapest has also supported Belgrade politically, espousing its accession to the EU and opposing Kosovo’s entry into the Council of Europe.

Orban has been similarly supportive of Dodik, a controversial politician who has been sanctioned by the US. This has included by voting against a resolution on the resolution on the Srebrenica genocide, and extending hundreds of millions of euros in grants and loans for Bosnia’s Serb entity Republika Srpska in recent years. This has helped compensate from the withdrawal of funds by fellow EU member Germany, which suspended funding for infrastructure projects in protest against Dodik’s secessionist activities. 

Hungarian officials have also spoken out against the international community’s role in Bosnia, while staying quiet on Dodik’s threats to promote the secession of Republika Srpska and thus break up Bosnia and risk a new war. 

New allies

Hungary has found more friends recently. A close ally of North Macedonia’s former prime minister Nikola Gruevski, who sought asylum in Hungary to avoid serving a prison sentence in a corruption case, Orban’s relations with Skopje languished under the subsequent Social Democratic government. But they have revived following the return of rightwing VMRO-DPMNE to power, reflected in Orban’s visit to Skopje after the change of government. 

The Hungarian prime minister said he would help to resolve the ongoing dispute between Skopje and Sofia that has held back North Macedonia’s EU accession process. Hungary’s involvement has extended beyond symbolic gestures: a €500mn loan from Hungary — suspected of originally being Chinese money — aims to bolster North Macedonia’s development. 

Orban’s man in Brussels

Orban’s influence over EU policy in the Western Balkans was helped by the appointment of Oliver Varhelyi as EU commissioner for neighbourhood and enlargement in 2019, a position seen as way  to bolster Hungary’s influence in the Balkans. 

The appointment was a controversial one. During his tenure, Varhelyi faced criticism for favouring Orban’s agenda, often at odds with the broader Commission stance. Key incidents include calls for an investigation into whether Varhelyi downplayed Serbia’s democratic backsliding and his expressed tacit support for Dodik’s separatist ambitions in Bosnia. Another controversy erupted in 2023 when Varhelyi was caught on a hot mic, slamming MEPs as “idiots”.

The European Policy Centre (EPC) said in a report published earlier this year that Orban’s transformation of Hungary into an “illiberal state” has provided an influential example for figures like Vucic and Dodik. Over the past decade, Serbia and Bosnia have regressed in democratic terms, with Freedom House ranking both countries as hybrid regimes, in line with Hungary’s status.

Orban has justified his alliances in the region as necessary for regional stability, especially in controlling migration flows and securing Hungary’s borders. Leaders like Vucic and Dodik have gained Orban’s endorsement by demonstrating their capacity to maintain order, a convenient alignment that allows Orban to advocate for their EU accession.

As well as the undermining of democracy, there are other similarities among Hungary and its allies. Both Georgia and Bosnia's Republika Srpska, for example, adopted laws on "foreign agents" targeting NGOs, modelled on Russian legislation, though Republika Srpska later scrapped its law without explanation. Hungary has adopted legislation restricting what its calls “LGBT propaganda”, while Georgia has gone further in adopting more restrictive legislation banning same-sex marriage and adoption by same-sex couples, and otherwise restricting LGBT rights. 

Cohesion threatened 

Orban’s presence in the Western Balkans bolsters Hungary’s influence but simultaneously threatens EU cohesion. By aligning with Vucic and Dodik, Orban has positioned himself as a broker between Brussels and the Balkan leaders, as pointed out in the EPC report. However, his advocacy for their EU membership contradicts the bloc’s democratic principles and undermines its security objectives.

At the same time, however, the actions taken by leaders in the region that align them with Orban are to an extent self defeating in that they make it harder to achieve accession. 

Serbia faces frequent criticism for its failure to align with EU sanctions policy and its continued dealings with Russia. Bosnia’s progress has repeatedly stalled as infighting between politicians prevents the adoption of legislation required by Brussels. VMRO-DPMNE has blocked the adoption of constitutional changes required to solve a dispute with Bulgaria and allow North Macedonia to begin accession negotiations. 

For Georgia, Orban’s new friend in the South Caucasus, a similar story is emerging. It already lags behind Moldova and Ukraine, which applied for membership at the same time, and EU officials have objected strong to Tbilisi's “foreign agents law” and anti-LGBT legislation. The controversy and allegations of Russian interference surrounding Georgian Dream’s latest election victory will only hold back its accession progress further. Georgia's accession is already in effect on ice, and the allegedly rigged election is seen as putting an end to the hopes of the launch of formal accession talks.