Malta’s Joseph Muscat, is forced to resign over the proximity of the investigation into the car-bomb murder of anti-corruption journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia to his office

All over the world, historians are dusting off a phrase that regularly has a sharp, if fleeting, relevance: Pre-revolutionary conditions.

In an increasingly polarised world, the battlelines are all too obvious — and hardening. The rise of Trump, Orban, Putin, Ergodan and the Brexiteers’ coup bewilders those who cling to the belief that post-WWII liberal values still have transformative, positive possibilities.

When Russia’s fourth-term dictator President Vladimir Putin poured his particularly chilling scorn on the idea of liberalism last week his demeanour, his stone-cold certainty suggested he is not a man to tolerate opposition.

Recent elections produced good results for pro-EU parties, but one of the areas in need of attention is the selection process for president of the Commission, writes billionaire lobbyist George Soros

Donald Trump’s own landing on the Normandy beaches to commemorate D-Day will be launched from the links in Doonbeg, Co Clare.

Hungary’s Viktor Orbán visits the White House today, but Donald Trump will try to cut an arms deal with him, not promote democracy, say Anne-Marie Slaughter and Melissa Hooper.

On the eve of elections that seem to carry particular weight for Israel and that troubled region, prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu pledged to annex Jewish settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories if he is re-elected tomorrow.

Fine Gael’s seven MEP candidates have said they were to the fore in seeking the suspension of Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orban from their European party grouping.

There is a huge difference between the aggressive nativism shown by Trump, Putin, Orban, and Brextremism and an expression of a calm, non-confrontational pride in your country. One can, and often does, lead to aggression.

Hungary’s Viktor Orbán’s was re-elected last weekend to serve a fourth term as prime minister.

To paraphrase Edmund Burke’s timeless warning — the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing — is probably so well-thumbed that its wake-up-and-smell-the-failure pungency has faded.

The European Court of Justice has rejected efforts by Hungary and Slovakia to stay out of a European Union scheme meant to relocate refugees.

Hungary's prime minister has asked the European Union to pay for half of the cost of anti-migrant fences it built on its southern borders, some €440m.

Manipulation or even outright control of the media cannot explain the enduring popularity, borne out by opinion polls, of illiberal leaders, writes Daniel Gros.

Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán has pursued control by varied and ruthless means — breaching EU law and his citizens’ rights. EU states have to do more than finger wag, writes Guy Verhofstadt

France will elect a president tomorrow and, if the opinion polls are correct, centrist Emmanuel Macron will defeat the National Front’s Marine Le Pen. A poll released yesterday showed that the pro-EU Mr Macron has extended his lead.

Slawomir Sierakowski looks at Antoni Macierewicz’s changes to Poland’s military and suggests he wants an army he can use against the people.

Poland is likely to lash out at the EU over a perceived recent humiliation. This could offer the EU a chance at emancipation, writes Slawomir Sierakowski.

A MID-TERM review of the Department of Education’s 2011-2020 literacy and numeracy strategy for schools has found that raise-the-bar targets set some years ago have been met or surpassed far more quickly than even the most optimistic predictions suggested. 

The decision by Viktor Orban to make it more difficult for immigrants to enter Hungary epitomises the greatest challenge facing the EU. How does it, how do we, deal with immigration? 

Maciej Kisilowski says the illiberal agenda is effective because its two target groups’ conservative cultural values inherently align. He tells progressives to get used to it or innovate.

For the past 20 years, Bayern Munich has enjoyed a near-monopoly of the Bundesliga title.

Hungary's prime minister has failed in his attempt to push through constitutional amendments opposing any future plan by the European Union to resettle asylum seekers among members of the bloc.

THE relief felt that Hungarian prime minster Viktor Orban’s campaign to reject a European Union refugees’ quota system has failed must be tempered by the fact that, of those who voted, 98% rejected the EU policy and supported the anti- immigrant Orban. 

Slawomir Sierakowski observes the rise in ‘illiberal’ democracy, namely in Central and Eastern Europe and advocates integration to stave off future crises and protect liberal norms

EU and Turkish leaders may soon announce a behind-the-scenes agreement to resettle 400,000 to 500,000 Syrian refugees directly from Turkey to the EU, Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orban has said.

Even before the Paris attacks, the mood in Central Europe was decidedly anti-migrant, with fences going up on borders, a Syrian beaten on a Polish street last week and the rhetoric sharp across the region.

Croatia’s prime minister has dismissed Hungary’s plan to build a fence between the two countries, arguing that nothing would be able to stop those seeking sanctuary in richer European countries.

The UN has warned that it could see no easing of the flow of refugees into Europe, with 8,000 arrivals daily, and that problems now facing governments may turn out to be only “the tip of the iceberg”.

Hungary’s parliament yesterday authorised the government to deploy the army to help handle a refugee crisis, granting the military the right to deploy a range of non-lethal force.

Echoes of the Cold War as EU fails to agree redistribution plan.

Hungarian authorities began busing weary migrants and refugees to a nearby registration centre, defusing some tensions at Hungary’s southern border with Serbia.

German chancellor Angela Merkel, reflecting on “a moving, in some parts breathtaking, weekend behind us,” said that all EU countries could help to accommodate the human tide from the Middle East and Africa.

Hundreds of refugees broke out of a Hungarian border camp and others set off on foot from Budapest as authorities scrambled to contain a crisis that has brought Europe’s asylum system to breaking point.

Hungary’s decision to break EU rules shutting the country to asylum seekers will cause a major row at today’s EU leaders summit in Brussels.

Following large-scale protests, Hungary’s prime minister has said the government would suspend a planned tax on internet use and reconsider the matter next year.

Hungary’s prime minister has said the government will suspend a planned tax on internet use and reconsider the matter next year.

For the first time ever, EU leaders have held a vote when nominating the next president of the European Commission, forced by Britain’s David Cameron to break a long tradition of consensus, supported by Hungary’s premier Viktor Orban.

The swollen River Danube is approaching Budapest, where soldiers and volunteers are building flood walls, officials said.

Tensions between Germany and Hungary have flared over remarks by the countries’ leaders, including references to Hitler’s occupation of the eastern European country in 1944 and an irritated German government response condemning Hungary’s allusion to the Nazi era as “deplorable derailment”.