“There are worldwide liberal fake news factories operating that spread global lies and attack people without any foundation while portraying it as the truth”, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Péter Szijjártó said on Kossuth Radio’s “Sunday papers” show.

The Minister recalled that when Donald Trump was elected President of the United States a little under two years ago, the liberal international media, with CNN at the fore, “suddenly realised” that it is not they who elect the country’s President, but American citizens.

According to the Hungarian Foreign Minister, the election of Donald Trump also caused hysteria in Europe, the words of the new President were distorted, for instance with relation to the role of NATO, and a huge amount of energy was also wasted by the fact that the international media claimed the Russians has interfered in the elections on the side of Trump. “This is what happened in the US, this piece of fake news existed for two years, and after two years it fell apart in such a way that those who invented these claims and kept them alive for two years didn’t bat an eye”, Mr. Szijjártó highlighted, adding that nobody at the media outlets that invented and maintained these lies have apologised to their readers or viewers for doing so.

According to the Minister, we can be certain that these media outlets are already working on producing the next piece of fake news, and any politician who strays from the liberal mainstream could be a target. “They wage a campaign against people who practice patriotic politics, who dare to state that their own county comes first, that religious, national and cultural identity are important, and who dares protect the security of their citizens with a wall, and attempt to discredit them with lies”, the Minister said.

“This phenomenon is not unusual in Europe either, and this is also the way the Hungarian Government is treated in view of the fact that all of the ‘rule-of-law-coated’ attacks belong in the category of fake news”, he emphasised, adding that the Hungarian media outlets with the most readers, viewers and visitors are all anti-government or critical of the government”. “I think the American example provides us with an excellent guide, because the U.S. President stood his ground and fought this battle for over two years, and it transpired that he was in the right (…); we must also stand our ground in this way, and must also flee forwards, and must also face the fact that the umpteenth found-out deception of these international fake news factories will induce the same thing as on previous occasions: they will invent another lie”, Mr. Szijjártó said.

(Cabinet Office of the Prime Minister/MTI)