Freedom House’s latest ‘Nations in Transit’ report, published on Wednesday, strongly criticises Serbia, Montenegro and Hungary for falling democratic standards and classifies all three countries for the first time as ‘hybrid regimes’.
“Hungary’s decline has been the most precipitous ever tracked in Nations in Transit; it was one of the three democratic frontrunners as of 2005, but in 2020 it became the first country to descend by two regime categories and leave the group of democracies entirely,” the report says.
In the Balkans, “years of increasing state capture, abuse of power, and strongman tactics employed by [President] Aleksandar Vucic in Serbia and [President] Milo Djukanovic in Montenegro have tipped those countries over the edge -for the first time since 2003, they are no longer categorised as democracies in Nations in Transit,” the report adds.
The report covers 29 countries in Eastern Europe, the Balkans and the former Communist bloc, classifying them into five categories: consolidated democracies, semi-consolidated democracies, transitional or hybrid regimes, semi-consolidated authoritarian regimes and consolidated authoritarian regimes.
Map of countries described in Nations in Transit report and their categories, measured by the level of democracy. Graph: Freedom House
Zselyke Csaky from Freedom House said that the reasons for Serbia, Montenegro and Hungary being reclassified as ‘hybrid regimes’ rather than democracies are different for each country.
“Hungary has seen the biggest decline ever recorded in our report, it has exceeded the average eightfold. Still, its trajectory showed that it takes time and political will to fully dismantle checks and balances and democratic institutions in a country – close to a decade. By now, as the coronavirus crisis has laid bare, the country’s institutions are nothing more than a facade as power is centralised in the hands of [Prime Minister] Viktor Orban,” Csaky told BIRN.
Ostensibly to tackle the coronavirus pandemic, the Hungarian parliament voted in March to allow Orban’s government to rule by decree without any time limit.
Csaky said that in the cases of Montenegro and Serbia, both countries have long had weak institutions and the reclassification was the result of a gradual degradation.
“In Montenegro, our report has registered negative developments related to judicial independence, media freedoms, and corruption,” she said.
She also said that the ruling Democratic Party of Socialists has captured state institutions and exerts a strong grip on the justice system.
In Serbia, Csaky said that there has been “a years-long deterioration under President Vucic, with attacks on the media, the lack of effective prosecution for corruption, and diminishing space for local governments”.
In relation to media freedoms in Serbia, the organisation highlighted few examples of pressures on journalists that happened last year, including the attack on Balkan Investigative Reporting Network editor, Slobodan Georgiev, who in April 2019 was vilified as a “traitor” in a Twitter video that also targeted other investigative media outlets.
Poland no longer a ‘consolidated democracy’
Situation in Poland, Hungary, Serbia and Montenegro, shown by Freedom House, for the period 2010-2020. Graph: Freedom House
The Freedom House report says that Poland stands out for the “systematic, targeted, and aggressive nature of the government’s attacks on judicial independence”.
“If Poland continues on this course, it will join hybrid regimes and autocracies that routinely mete out politicised justice,” it warns.
Csaky said that Freedom House no longer classifies Poland as a ‘consolidated democracy’ primarily because of the ruling Law and Justice party’s “destructive changes to the judiciary”
In Albania, Bulgaria, Montenegro, Serbia and Romania, the report notes problems with governments re not allowing the opposition to participate properly in the law-making procedure, and that in some of these countries, this has led to the opposition boycotting parliament.
The report praises the example of Slovakia, where an investigation into the murder of journalist Jan Kuciak and his fiancée “exposed a ‘network’ of high-level politicians, members of the judiciary, and organised crime figures who were all connected to Marian Kocner, the underworld businessman accused of ordering the killings”.
Freedom House notes that Russian attempts to exert influence have been problematic for years, but also warns about the use of “debt diplomacy” by China – providing countries with funds “in a way that creates political dependency”.
“As a result, foreign-held debt in the region is increasingly found in the hands of the Chinese government: Tajikistan, Montenegro, and North Macedonia owe 41, 39, and 20 per cent of their debt, respectively, to China,” the report says.