Another year in 'illiberal' Hungary - Annual Report of 2015

In April 2014 the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) declared invalid the Data Retention Directive that unified the rules of the retention of selective data by Internet and telephone services and determined the accessibility of data by authorities in the member states. Despite the content of the judgment, the Hungarian act allowing data retention is still in force. In October, 2014 the HCLU started litigation against two major service providers in order to force the Hungarian Constitutional Court (CC) to repeal the unlawful act.

A human rights crisis has emerged in the Ukraine. One after another, the institutions and Member States of the European Union have spoken up against violence and in the defence of democracy but the leaders of the Hungarian administration keep deep silence. The Hungarian Civil Liberties Union has sent a letter to Viktor Orbán calling him as the responsible head of the Hungarian Government to stand up against the authoritarianism and violence from the part of the state in the neighbouring Ukraine and to offer mediation services to facilitate a peaceful resolution of the crisis as soon as possible.