The International Press Institute today is joined by members of the Coalition Against SLAPPs in Europe (CASE) in sending a letter to Márta Görög, Hungary’s Minister of Justice, and Zoltán Tarr, Minister for Social Relations and Culture. The letter urges them to ensure the adoption of a strong anti-SLAPP law, accept the Hungarian Civil Liberties Union’s request for an in-person consultation, and engage in meaningful dialogue with expert civil society organisations in Hungary.
Read the full letter below, which IPI sent today.
Dear Márta Görög and Zoltán Tarr,
The undersigned organisations are writing to you as members of the Coalition Against SLAPPs in Europe (CASE), an alliance of over 120 non-governmental organisations from across Europe and beyond united in the fight against Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation (SLAPPs).
Our organisations firstly welcome the positive steps taken so far by the new Tisza government and your Ministry to improve the legal landscape for freedom of expression and the freedom of the press in Hungary, after years of sustained democratic and rule of law backsliding.
We also welcome the new Government’s stated commitment to greater openness and meaningful public consultation, which it has presented as an important departure from the practices of its predecessor.
As part of this ongoing reform process, we note the recent public consultation launched regarding a draft bill which would amend several justice related laws, including new provisions intended to transpose the European Union’s 2024 Anti-SLAPP Directive.
CASE organisations and its Hungarian member welcome this step in transposing the Directive, the deadline for which passed on 7 May 2026. SLAPPs are an emerging but serious concern in Hungary, highlighting the need for effective legal safeguards to protect journalists and other public watchdogs from abusive litigation by powerful actors seeking to silence public debate.
In our view, the legal amendments foreseen within the current draft bill, which we note was published with only five working days of public consultation, represent a basic and verbatim transposition of the EU Directive which would introduce only minimum standards. Crucially, this reform would only safeguard public watchdogs in Hungary against cross-border SLAPPs, leaving them without such protection in cases that are purely domestic.
While our organisations recognise the desire at the political level for swift transposition of the Directive – given the recent opening of infringement proceedings against Hungary by the European Commission over the delay – we warn that a rushed reform process would fail to address the majority of SLAPP cases in Hungary, which are domestic in nature.
Our organisations fear that if the current bill is not amended to create a wider anti-SLAPP framework which includes domestic cases as well as cross-border, journalists and other public watchdogs will continue to operate in a legal climate in which powerful political or economic actors within Hungary can abuse civil proceedings to muzzle and censor public debate.
We note that in recent months EU Member States, including Poland, Greece and Belgium have passed new laws which both transpose the Directive and go beyond its minimum standards by expanding legal protections to domestically-filed lawsuits. These reforms broadly align with the high standards set out by the 2024 Council of Europe Recommendation on SLAPPs.
The Hungarian Civil Liberties Union, a member of CASE, has sent a detailed assessment of the draft bill along with recommendations for reform, which we attach with this letter. An additionally important recommendation outlined here – and backed by CASE partners – is that the bill should also be expanded to cover criminal proceedings as well as administrative litigation.
Moving forward, the undersigned CASE partners urge your Ministry to accept the request by the HCLU for an in-person consultation and to engage in meaningful dialogue with it and other expert civil society organisations in Hungary. Such dialogue is essential not only to improve this bill in line with the highest European standards set out in the Council of Europe Recommendation, but also to ensure that the legal safeguards take account of the particular patterns that organisations with direct experience of litigating such cases see emerging in Hungary.
Our organisations remain at your disposal to provide expert input, legal analysis, and European perspectives on anti-SLAPP legislation and litigation, and are available to travel to Budapest or meet online. With Parliament not likely to vote on this bill until September, we urge you to closely consider the recommendations in the coming weeks and to craft legislation accordingly. If more time is needed to conduct a proper public consultation and develop a comprehensive anti-SLAPP bill, then this reform process should be pushed until later in autumn, with expert input.
If Hungary is to make sustained and concrete progress in restoring democracy and the rule of law, it is essential that public watchdogs and independent journalists are able to operate in a legal climate in which the law cannot be abused to silence and censor them. Hungary both deserves and requires high quality Anti-SLAPP laws. Our organisations hope to see these recommendations included into the reform and look forward to reading your response.
Signed:
International Press Institute (IPI)
ARTICLE 19 Europe
Civil Liberties Union for Europe
European Centre for Press and Media Freedom (ECPMF)
European Federation of Journalists (EFJ)
Foundation Atelier for Community Transformation – ACT
Free Press Unlimited (FPU)
Frente Cívica, Portugal
Greenpeace Magyarország
Index on Censorship
Institute for Mass Media, Cyprus
Legal Human Academy
Pro Publico (PP)
Reporters Without Borders (RSF)
SLAPP Watch Coalition Turkey
South East Europe Media Organisation (SEEMO)