Home » News » The Prosecution Service of Hungary’s response to the untrue allegations about the Prosecution Service in the European Commission’s annual Rule of Law Report – Press release of the Office of the Prosecutor General

The Euro­pe­an Com­mis­si­on has pub­lis­hed its annu­al Rule of Law Report, which con­ta­ins a num­ber of inacc­ura­ci­es and unt­ruths con­cer­ning the Pro­se­cu­ti­on Ser­vi­ce of Hun­gary. In order to pro­vi­de the pub­lic with cor­rect and cre­dib­le infor­ma­ti­on, the Pro­se­cu­ti­on Ser­vi­ce refu­tes the Report and draws attent­ion to the fol­lo­wing.

  1. Poli­ti­cal inf­lu­en­ce on the pro­se­cu­ti­on ser­vi­ce

The Report sta­tes that "Poli­ti­cal inf­lu­en­ce on the pro­se­cu­ti­on ser­vi­ce rema­ins, with the risk of undue inter­fe­ren­ce with indi­vi­du­al cases."

This claim is comp­le­te non­sen­se.

The pro­se­cu­ti­on ser­vi­ce acts pro­fes­si­o­nally, free of poli­ti­cal inf­lu­en­ce and in accor­dance with the law in every sing­le case. If anyone is aware of any such inf­lu­en­ce, they sho­uld bring it to the attent­ion of the pro­se­cu­ti­on ser­vi­ce and it will be tho­ro­ughly investiga­ted.

We would like to draw your attent­ion to the so-called Péter Magyar case, who cla­ims that the work of the pro­se­cu­ti­on ser­vi­ce in one case was inf­lu­en­ced by poli­ti­cal inf­lu­en­ce and that poli­ti­ci­ans mani­pu­la­ted the investiga­ti­on docu­ments. In this case, after an exten­sive and detai­led investiga­ti­on, the pro­se­cu­ti­on ser­vi­ce ter­mi­na­ted the pro­ce­e­dings.

https://ugyeszseg.hu/sajtokozlemeny-a-volt-igazsagugyi-miniszter-maganbeszelgeteset-tartalmazo-hangfelvetellel-kapcsolatos-nyomozasrol/

(Press rele­a­se on the investiga­ti­on into the audio record­ing of a pri­vate con­versa­ti­on of the for­mer Minis­ter of Jus­ti­ce

  1. Judi­ci­al review of pro­se­cu­to­ri­al deci­sions on cor­rupt­ion

The Report points out that „Court deci­sions revie­wing pro­se­cu­to­ri­al deci­sions not to investiga­te or pro­se­cu­te cor­rupt­ion are still not bind­ing and have so far not bro­ught sig­ni­fi­cant results, alt­ho­ugh the pos­si­bi­lity of judi­ci­al review incen­ti­vi­ses pro­se­cu­tors to assess alle­ga­tions more tho­ro­ughly.”

The claim is incor­rect beca­u­se of the fol­lo­wing rea­sons.

Fol­lo­wing the fil­ing of a moti­on for review, the investigat­ing judge may deci­de to set aside the con­tes­ted deci­si­on, at which point an investiga­ti­on will be ini­tia­ted or the pro­ce­e­dings will con­ti­nue. This deci­si­on is bind­ing.

If the court has deci­ded to ini­tia­te or con­ti­nue the investiga­ti­on on the basis of the moti­on for review, and the investigat­ing aut­ho­rity or the prosecutor's offi­ce ter­mi­na­tes the cri­mi­nal pro­ce­e­dings again, it is pos­sib­le to file a new moti­on for review.

If the court cons­iders that the deci­si­on to ter­mi­na­te the pro­ce­e­dings sho­uld be set aside, the court shall, ins­tead of sett­ing aside the deci­si­on, est­ab­lish that an indict­ment may be filed.

The pro­se­cu­ti­on ser­vi­ce can­not be obli­ged to file indict­ment; such a sti­pu­la­ti­on would be uncons­ti­tu­ti­o­nal and incom­pa­tib­le with the inde­pen­den­ce of the pro­se­cu­ti­on ser­vi­ce. Howe­ver, the per­son who files the moti­on for review may file a moti­on for indict­ment, i.e. he has the pos­si­bi­lity to bring the case to court.

 Howe­ver, this has not hap­pe­ned in any case since the cre­a­ti­on of the legal inst­ru­ment, which makes it clear that the pro­se­cu­ti­on ser­vi­ce has acted law­fully and cor­rectly in all the con­tes­ted cases.

All the rele­vant infor­ma­ti­on on the moti­on for review as a legal inst­ru­ment can be found here:

https://ugyeszseg.hu/anonimizalt-hatarozatok/

(Ano­ny­mi­sed deci­sions)

 Hie­rar­chi­cal archi­tec­tu­re of the pro­se­cu­ti­on ser­vi­ce

The Report cri­ti­ci­zes the fact that „.. the strictly hie­rar­chi­cal archi­tec­tu­re of the pro­se­cu­ti­on ser­vi­ce and a lack of inter­nal checks and balan­ces enhance the pers­is­tent risk of top pro­se­cu­tors inf­lu­enc­ing the work of subor­di­na­te pro­se­cu­tors, inc­lu­ding in indi­vi­du­al cases.”

The Report is inacc­ura­te and mis­lead­ing for the fol­lo­wing rea­sons.

The Con­sul­ta­tive Coun­cil of Euro­pe­an Pub­lic Pro­se­cu­tors of the Coun­cil of Euro­pe, in its Recom­men­da­ti­on Rec. 2000 No. 19, sta­ted that the hie­rar­chi­cal struc­tu­re of the pro­se­cu­ti­on ser­vi­ce is a solu­ti­on in accor­dance with the rule of law.

The Veni­ce Com­mis­si­on came to the same conc­lu­si­on in its Opin­ion No 668/2012 of 19 June 2012. It conc­lu­ded that the Hun­ga­ri­an pro­se­cu­to­ri­al orga­ni­sa­ti­on is a hie­rar­chi­cal and auto­no­mous orga­ni­sa­ti­on, which allows pro­se­cu­tors to ope­ra­te free of poli­tics. The laws gover­ning the pro­se­cu­ti­on ser­vi­ce con­ta­in impor­tant gua­ran­te­es for pro­se­cu­tors to eli­mi­na­te cor­rupt­ion.

The Hun­ga­ri­an pro­se­cu­ti­on ser­vi­ce is inde­pen­dent of the exe­cu­tive; the govern­ment or the Minis­ter of Jus­ti­ce can­not give instruc­tions to the pro­se­cu­tor gene­ral. Apart from Hun­gary, there are other EU count­ri­es with an inde­pen­dent pro­se­cu­ti­on ser­vi­ce, accoun­tab­le to Par­lia­ment, such as Slo­va­kia, Fin­land and Por­tugal. The French and Ger­man models of pro­se­cu­ti­on ser­vi­ce are highly hie­rar­chi­cal, with the Minis­ter of Jus­ti­ce hav­ing the power to dis­miss and, in France, to remo­ve pro­se­cu­tors from their posit­ions. The Com­mis­si­on has not raised any objec­tions to the orga­ni­sa­ti­on of the pro­se­cu­ti­on ser­vi­ces in these count­ri­es, des­pi­te their par­ti­al simil­ari­ti­es with the Hun­ga­ri­an model.

The pro­se­cu­tor gene­ral does not give instruc­tions in indi­vi­du­al cases. Nor does he have the power, as for examp­le the Pro­se­cu­tor Gene­ral of Slo­va­kia, to ter­mi­na­te pro­ce­e­dings in any case on his own aut­ho­rity wit­ho­ut giving rea­sons (§ 363 of the Slo­vak Cri­mi­nal Pro­ce­du­re Code).

It fol­lows from the struc­tu­re of the orga­ni­sa­ti­on and legal provi­sions that the seni­or pro­se­cu­tor may give instruc­tions to the subor­di­na­te pro­se­cu­tor, in which case s/he is res­pon­sib­le for the instruc­tions. If the pro­se­cu­tor does not agree with the instruc­ti­on of the seni­or pro­se­cu­tor, s/he may request that it be put in writing, and until this is done, the instruc­ti­on is not obli­ga­to­ry.

If the pro­se­cu­tor cons­iders the instruc­ti­on to be incom­pa­tib­le with the law or with his/her legal con­vic­tions, s/he may request in writing that s/he be excu­s­ed from pro­se­cu­ting the case, stat­ing his/her legal posit­i­on, and such a request may not be refu­s­ed.

  1. High-level” cor­rupt­ion

Accord­ing to the Report „Whe­re­as the num­ber of con­vic­tions for corruption-related cri­mes has inc­re­as­ed in low level cor­rupt­ion cases, there has been no prog­ress yet to est­ab­lish a robust track record aga­inst high-level cor­rupt­ion.”.

It is impor­tant to high­light that the Commission's experts asked quest­ions on high-level cor­rupt­ion cases in 2022 and 2023. The quest­ions sent to the mee­ting with the rep­re­s­en­ta­ti­ves of the pro­se­cu­ti­on ser­vi­ce in Feb­ru­ary 2024 did not inc­lu­de a request for data on high-level cor­rupt­ion cases, and the­re­fo­re the pro­se­cu­ti­on ser­vi­ce did not pro­vi­de any infor­ma­ti­on on deve­lop­ments. The Com­mis­si­on itself does not refer to recent data, but to the find­ings of the 2022 and 2023 Rule of Law Reports.

It sho­uld also be noted that the Hun­ga­ri­an Cri­mi­nal Code does not pro­vi­de a defi­ni­ti­on of high-level cor­rupt­ion, nor is there an exact defi­ni­ti­on of high-level cor­rupt­ion in inter­na­ti­o­nal (EU) law. The pro­se­cu­ti­on ser­vi­ce is still awa­i­ting feed­back on the Euro­pe­an Commission's interp­re­ta­ti­on of high-level cor­rupt­ion cases.

The pro­se­cu­ti­on ser­vi­ce has indic­ted seve­ral seni­or offi­ci­als in cor­rupt­ion cases, which have been repor­ted to the press and the pub­lic.

  1. The Cor­rupt­ion Per­cept­ions Index

The Report also sta­tes that „ The per­cept­ion among experts and busi­ness exe­cu­ti­ves is that the level of cor­rupt­ion in the pub­lic sec­tor rema­ins high.”

This sta­te­ment is not acc­ura­te eit­her.

The pro­se­cu­ti­on ser­vi­ce moni­tors all reports and analy­ses that may be use­ful to pro­vi­de a more comp­le­te pic­tu­re of the cor­rupt­ion situ­a­ti­on in Hun­gary.

In June 2023, Euro­ba­ro­me­ter pub­lis­hed the find­ings of its sur­vey "Citi­zens' atti­tu­des towards cor­rupt­ion in the EU in 2023".

The 2023 Euro­ba­ro­me­ter sur­vey shows a large dif­fe­ren­ce bet­ween res­pon­dents' per­cept­ions of the extent to which cor­rupt­ion is wides­pre­ad in our count­ry (88% said it was wides­pre­ad) and whet­her cor­rupt­ion affects them in their daily lives. To the lat­ter quest­ion, 22% ans­we­red yes, which, in cont­rast to Tran­spa­rency International's much less favo­u­rab­le sur­vey, puts Hun­gary in the mid­field of EU Mem­ber Sta­tes and two per­cen­tage points above the EU aver­age.

The dif­fe­ren­ce is even lar­ger in res­pon­se to the quest­ion whet­her the res­pon­dent had per­so­nally expe­ri­en­ced or wit­nes­sed a case of cor­rupt­ion in the last 12 months: 9% of the res­pon­dents said yes to this quest­ion. This 9% of the responses/cases falls wit­hin the com­pe­ten­ce of the pro­se­cu­ti­on ser­vi­ce.

The rela­ted press rele­a­se issu­ed by the pro­se­cu­ti­on ser­vi­ce is ava­i­lab­le here:

https://ugyeszseg.hu/a-korrupcioerzekeles-valos-helyzete-magyarorszagon-az-eurobarometer-hivatalos-merese-tukreben-a-legfobb-ugyeszseg-sajtokozlemenye/

(The rea­lity of the per­cept­ion of cor­rupt­ion in Hun­gary – in the light of the offi­ci­al Euro­ba­ro­me­ter sur­vey - press rele­a­se of the Offi­ce of the Pro­se­cu­tor Gene­ral)

To sum up:

The cla­ims of the Rule of Law Report con­cer­ning the pro­se­cu­ti­on ser­vi­ce are unt­rue and mis­lead­ing. The Pro­se­cu­ti­on Ser­vi­ce of Hun­gary is cons­ti­tu­ti­o­nally struc­tu­red in a hie­rar­chi­cal man­ner, which acts pro­fes­si­o­nally in every sing­le case, free from poli­ti­cal inf­lu­en­ce and in full comp­li­ance with the law.

No moti­on for indict­ment have been filed in the cases that can be chal­len­ged with a moti­on for review, so the court deci­sions in the con­tes­ted cases also con­firm that the pro­se­cu­ti­on ser­vi­ce has acted law­fully and cor­rectly.