Watchdog

BUDAPEST -- The Hungarian government, seeking to prevent a blocking of European Union funds over corruption concerns, said it is ready to send new laws to parliament in the coming days to overcome Brussels’ objections.

The remarks on September 17 come just days ahead of an expected announcement by the European Commission, the EU's executive arm, that the bloc is ready to suspend the transfer of some EU funds to Hungary over the corruption concerns.

It also comes after the European Parliament on September 15 approved a resolution saying Hungary was no longer a "full democracy."

The European Parliament voted 433-to-123 with 28 abstentions to approve the report, which said Hungary had become “a hybrid regime of electoral autocracy” under the leadership of [Prime Minister Viktor] Orban's nationalist government, and that its undermining of the bloc’s democratic values had taken the country out of the community of democracies.

Fidesz, Orban's ruling party, blasted the European Parliament for the resolution, calling it "unforgivable" that "the European Parliament is attacking Hungary again."

On September 17, Orban's chief of staff, Gergely Gulyas, said Budapest would establish an anti-corruption department and a working group with nongovernmental organizations to oversee spending of the EU funds based on commission requirements.

"The government has either accepted the requests of the European Commission, or in the areas where we could not accept them, we have managed to reach a compromise that is satisfactory to both parties," Gulyas told reporters.

"At today's meeting, the government discussed these commitments and has approved them," he said, adding that the new laws are to take effect in November. "Instead of mutual distrust, the constructive series of negotiations with the commission over the past two months can be seen as a step toward mutual trust."

Orban, who was reelected for a fourth consecutive term in April, has clashed often with the bloc over issues such as judicial independence, public procurement, LGBT rights, and media, academic, and religious freedoms.

Since sweeping to power on his nationalist agenda in 2010, Orban, who characterizes the country as an "illiberal democracy," has rewritten the constitution and key aspects of electoral laws and consolidated allies' control of nearly every major media outlet in the country.

The European Parliament report actually blamed the European Union's other 26 members for being "inactive" to Orban's democratic abuses during his rule, saying part of the problem was "the inability of the [European] Council to make meaningful progress to counter democratic backsliding."

With reporting by AP and Reuters

BELGRADE -- LGBT pride supporters conducted a scaled-down walk in central Belgrade on September 17 after a larger parade was barred by Serbian authorities and as far-right opponents clashed with police on the city’s streets.

Several minor incidents were reported in capital, with right-wing activists and religious groups opposing the international EuroPride event gathering.

Police said 64 people were detained for various offenses after anti-gay activists threw bottles at police and tried to cross police cordons.

An estimated 1,000 LGBT pride supporters walked a few hundred meters on a route from the Constitutional Court to the nearby Tasmajdan Park in the center of Belgrade after authorities barred a planned longer march.

Even as the walk began, it remained unclear what the scale of it would be or how the authorities might react amid conflicting signals from government officials.

Police had blocked off pedestrian areas around streets where organizers had scheduled events and had also banned counter-protests scheduled by pro-Serbian Orthodox Church conservative groups and others.

As of early evening, some participants began walking a route that organizers had changed and shortened after the previous one was blocked by police.

National populist President Aleksandar Vucic last month suggested that the EuroPride march would not be allowed to go ahead but said the final decision lay in the hands of the Interior Ministry.

On September 13, the Interior Ministry officially announced the ban on the EuroPride Week's culminating march through downtown Belgrade and said it had similarly denied permission for a counterdemonstration the same day.

It concluded that there was a “danger of violence, destruction of property, and other forms of disruption of public order on a larger scale."

On September 15, local organizer Marko Mihailovic told an Instagram livestream with RFE/RL's Balkan Service that his group had filed an appeal with a Serbian administrative court against the Interior Ministry's decision to block the event.

"The question is whether it will be a short walk or whether we will stand in one place, but we will go out into the streets," Mihailovic said. "It is important that we go out and that our voice is heard."

After the ban was announced, gay rights activists at a human rights conference jeered Serbian Prime Minister Ana Brnabic, who is openly lesbian but has been accused by the Serbian gay community of abandoning their cause.

Despite an official ban on a march, Brnabic earlier told prospective participants that "no one can stop you [from walking], because that is a fundamental human right."

The European Pride Organizers Association on September 17 said it had received guarantees from Brnabic that “she can guarantee that the streets of Belgrade will be safe this afternoon.”

"Serbia did not organize EuroPride because someone blackmailed it to stay on the European path but for the sake of Serbia, our people and society, as well as for the well-being of the entire region," she told a reception for foreign diplomats on the occasion of EuroPride Week.

Still, Interior Minister Aleksandar Vulin on September 17 said police would not tolerate any violence on the streets of Belgrade and that it will strictly implement the law and the decisions of authorities and courts.

“All means permitted by law will be applied to anyone who violates public order and peace," he said.

Following the event, Vulin insisted that the ban on a march had been enforced and that the people were only being "escorted to a concert."

Also after the event, Brnabic told reporters that “the police did a great job” and that she was proud that “we managed to avoid more serious incidents.”

She added that the matter was now closed and that “it's time to focus on things that are more difficult and important."

Officials said 64 people had been arrested for various offenses.

EuroPride Week celebrates lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and intersex pride at the pan-European level and has been hosted by a different European city nearly every year since 1992.

A 2010 Pride rally in Belgrade descended into violence that injured dozens of police and civilians when anti-LGBT mobs, including some clerics, swarmed and attacked participants, but subsequent Pride events took place without major incidents.

The Balkan country, which is bidding to eventually join the European Union, had been under intense international pressure to allow the march to take place.

The U.S., French, and British embassies, among others, issued a joint statement urging the authorities to lift the ban.

With reporting by AP and AFP