A Hungarian Democracy Activist’s Rise to Authoritarian Leader
BUDAPEST — A quarter-century ago, as Hungary helped ignite the events that would lead to the collapse of communism, the ferment produced a new political star.
Viktor Orban was 26 then and a longhaired law graduate. In June 1989, five months before the Berlin Wall came down, he lit up a commemoration of the failed 1956 revolt against Moscow with a bold call for free elections and a demand that 80,000 Soviet troops go home.
Now, as the 25th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall is commemorated Sunday, Hungary is a member of NATO and the European Union and Mr. Orban is in his third term as prime minister. But what was once a journey that might have embodied the triumph of democratic capitalism has evolved into a much more complex tale of a country and a leader who in the time since have come to question Western values, foment nationalism and look more openly at Russia as a model.
After leading his right-wing party to a series of national and local election victories, Mr. Orban is rapidly centralizing power, raising a crop of crony oligarchs, cracking down on dissent, expanding ties with Moscow, and generally drawing uneasy comparisons from Western leaders and internal opponents to President Vladimir V. Putin.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/08/world/europe/viktor-orban-steers-hungary-toward-russia-25-years-after-fall-of-the-berlin-wall.html?_r=0