French Minister: The Union will omit Hungary and Poland from the recovery plan if they continue to veto it

French Minister: The Union will omit Hungary and Poland from the recovery plan if they continue to veto it

The European Union (EU) will omit Poland and Hungary from its economic recovery plan if the two countries continue to resist efforts to combine the disbursement of financial assistance with the rule of law. This was stated by the French Minister for European Affairs Clément Beaune. He admitted that such a step was legally complex, but possible. "Our position is clear - we are not sacrificing recovery (of the economy) or the rule of law," Beaune told the Journal du Dimanche. He added that the abolition of the condition of respect for the rule of law was out of the question. Hungary and Poland have been blocking the approval of the EU's seven-year budget for weeks, as well as the mobilization of the recovery fund to help the bloc's economies recover from the recession caused by the new coronavirus pandemic. Beaune said that both Eastern European countries risk losing financial contributions in the order of billions of euros if they continue to insist on their sentence. He emphasized that this was not a threat, but a direct consequence of the absence of a new budget.