Democracy Digest: Poland Accuses EU of ‘Hybrid War’, While Hungary Claims Victory

The conservative daily quotes from a letter sent by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen to European Parliament President David Sassoli, in which she dismisses the criticism that the executive has failed to implement the rule-of-law conditionality.

Despite officially entering in force in January, the mechanism's implementation has effectively been suspended by the European Commission until after the Hungarian parliamentary elections in the spring of 2022, the European Parliament claims. Hungary and Poland have challenged the new legislation at the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU), where rulings can take years.

Trying to speed up the process, the European Parliament adopted a resolution in March that threatened to sue the European Commission for inaction. Receiving no response, Sassoli then sent a formal letter to von der Leyen in June, addressing the executive's failure to act.

In her official response, quoted by Magyar Nemzet, von der Leyen claimed the European Parliament had not come up with any specific case where the conditionality clause should have been implemented.

"As regards the application of the Regulation through the activation of the procedure in the most obvious cases, as requested in the resolution of 10 June 2021… for the Commission to be able to take a position, the Parliament should explain in concrete terms which are those cases, why it considers that the conditions set out in the Regulation are fulfilled and why the Commission would not have respected its obligation to act within a reasonable timeframe," the letter read.

A Commission spokesperson confirmed that the executive doesn't intend to take any action for the time being and is currently drafting guidelines to facilitate the...